THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

RIVERSIDE 


AN  INTRODUCTION 
TO  WORLD  POLITICS 


THE  CENTURY 
POLITICAL  SCIENCE  SERIES 

Edited  by 

FREDEEIC  A.  OGG 

University  of  Wisconsin 


Introduction  to  American  Government.  By  Frederic 
A.  Ogg,  University  of  Wisconsin,  and  P.  Orman 
Eay,  Northwestern  University. 

American  Parties  and  Elections.  By  Edward  M. 
Sait,   University  of   California. 

State  Government  in  the  United  States.  By  Walter 
F.  Dodd,  Chicago,  Illinois. 

Municipal  Government.  By  Thomas  H.  Eeed,  Uni- 
versity of  California. 

Constitutional  Law  of  the  United  States.  By  Ed- 
ward S.  Corwin,  Princeton  University. 

Constitutional  History  of  the  United  States.  By 
Andrew  C.  McLaughlin,  University  of  Chicago. 

The  Conduct  of  American  Foreign  Relations.  By 
John  M.  Mathews,  University  of  Illinois. 

Outlines  of  World  Politics.  By  Herbert  Adams  Gib- 
bons, Princeton,  New  Jersey. 

European  Diplomacy,  1914-1921.  By  Charles  Seymour, 
Yale  University. 

Introduction  to  the  Study  of  International  Or- 
ganization. By  Pitman  B.  Potter,  University  of 
Wisconsin. 

American  Interests  and  Policies  in  the  Far  East. 
By  Stanley  K.  Hornbeck,  Washington,  D.  C. 

Latin  America  and  the  United  States.  By  Graham 
H.  Stuart,  University  of  Wisconsin. 

Eecent  and  Contemporary  Political  Theory.  By 
Francis  W.  Coker,  Ohio  State  University. 

Elements  of  International  Law.  By  Charles  G.  Fen- 
wick,  Bryn  Mawr  College. 


Other  volumes  to  be  arranged 


AN   INTRODUCTION 
TO  WORLD  POLITICS 


BY 


HERBERT  ADAMS  GIBBONS 

Ph.D.,  LITT.D.,  F.R.HIST.S. 


NEW  YORK 
THE  CENTURY  CO. 
1922 


0^57 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
The  Centuet  Co. 


Printed  in  U.  8.  A. 


PREFACE 

At  the  beginning  of  the  World  War  I  wrote  a  book  about 
the  relations  among  the  great  powers  during  the  years 
immediately  preceding  the  assassination  at  Serajevo.  ' '  The 
New  Map  of  Europe"  dealt  particularly  with  Near  Eastern 
problems  and  wars  and  with  the  foreign  policies  of  Russia, 
Austria-Hungary,  Germany,  and  Italy  in  the  events  affect- 
ing the  Balkan  States,  the  Ottoman  Empire,  Persia,  and  the 
countries  on  the  African  littoral  of  the  Mediterranean. 
The  purpose  of  the  book  was  to  attempt  to  explain  how  the 
relations  among  the  great  powers  were  vitally  influenced 
by  the  conflict  of  interests  that  arose  in  their  diplomatic 
and  economic  activities  in  the  regions  formerly  under  the 
exclusive  domination  of  the  Ottoman  sultans.  The  recep- 
tion accorded  ''The  New  Map  of  Europe"  encouraged  me 
to  complete  the  survey  of  contemporary  international  rela- 
tions by  writing  *'The  New  Map  of  Africa"  in  1916  and 
''The  New  Map  of  Asia"  in  1919.  The  latter  two  volumes 
outlined  the  development  of  European  overlordship  in 
Africa  and  Asia. 

None  who  lived  in  daily  contact  with  international  ques- 
tions, and  who  was  reporting  from  the  spot  wars  and 
rumors  of  wars  during  the  decade  before  1914,  could  be 
satisfied  with  the  prevalent  idea  that  it  was  unnecessary  to 
go  farther  back  than  the  famous  "twelve  days"  of  diplo- 
matic correspondence,  from  July  20  to  August  2,  1914,  to 
settle  the  responsibility  for  the  World  War.  However 
great  the  guilt  of  the  Imperial  German  and  Austro-Hun- 
garian  governments  for  deliberately  forcing  the  war  upon 
Europe,  their  power  was  not  so  great  that  their  wiU  alone 
could  have  led  us  into  the  calamities  of  1914-18.    The  most 


vi  PREFACE 

bitter  and  unthinking  partizan  of  armistice  and  peace  con- 
ference days  sees  now  that  the  elimination  of  Germany 
and  Austria-Hungary  from  world  politics  has  not  brought 
us  peace.  Europe  is  still  in  arms,  and  the  victorious 
powers  are  pitted  against  one  another  in  the  Near  East 
and  the  Far  East.  Must  we  not  admit,  then,  that  Realpolitik 
and  Weltpolitik  are  human,  and  not  simply  German,  phe- 
nomena, and  that  they  call  for  attention  no  less  after  our 
victory  than  before  the  war? 

This  is  the  justification  for  the  study  of  world  politics 
as  a  separate  branch  of  political  science.  Anthropologists 
write  of  race;  geographers  of  climate;  economists  of 
finance  and  trade  and  commerce ;  demographers  of  popula- 
tion; sociologists  of  living  conditions;  missionaries  of 
cultural  conquest  in  the  name  of  religion;  jurists  of  inter- 
national law;  diplomatists  of  the  technique  of  dealings 
among  nations ;  military  experts  of  the  conduct  of  wars  and 
the  role  of  armies  and  navies  in  peace  and  war ;  statesmen 
of  the  immediate  and  ostensible  causes  of  war  and  aims  of 
peace;  propagandists  of  national  movements  and  particu- 
lar interests;  humanists  of  improving  world  conditions; 
publicists  of  current  events;  and  general  historians  set 
forth  and  interpret  the  activities  of  nations  comprehen- 
sively, stressing  political  evolution  and  states  of  mind  as 
well  as  recording  events.  Up  to  the  nineteenth  century  the 
specialist  in  international  relations  is  not  needed.  But 
since  the  birth  of  nationalism,  the  use  of  steam  in  produc- 
tion and  transportation,  and  the  consequent  rise  of  world 
powers,  he  has  a  field  of  his  own. 

The  field  is  difficult,  however,  because  the  problems  dis- 
cussed and  the  questions  raised  have  been  the  storm  center 
of  men's  thoughts  for  the  past  ten  years.  These  problems 
have  been  approached  unintelligently,  and  opinions  have 
been  formed  without  knowledge.  Teachers  of  the  historical 
and  political  sciences  in  American  universities  and  colleges 
have  had  a  curious  experience.    Their  colleagues  in  other 


PREFACE  vii 

departments  would  be  astounded  if  professors  of  history 
and  political  science  should  presume  to  lay  down  the  law 
to  them  in  their  particular  fields.  And  yet  professors  of 
philosophy,  mathematics,  astronomy,  languages,  engineer- 
ing, chemistry,  medicine,  theology,  and  law  have  written 
books  and  articles  and  have  lectured  on  problems  of  world 
politics,  without  having  acquainted  themselves  with  even 
the  rudiments  of  the  subject.  An  architect,  who  has  created 
masterpieces,  told  me  one  day  that  a  lecture  I  gave  on 
African  colonization  was  wrong  from  beginning  to  end. 
He  could  contradict  none  of  my  facts,  and  when  I  pressed 
him  he  confessed  that  he  had  never  read  a  book  on  the 
extension  of  European  control  over  Africa,  ''But  I  have 
been  in  Algiers,"  he  declared.  ''And  I  have  been  in  a 
Gothic  cathedral,"  I  answered;  "but  what  would  you  think 
of  me  if  I  contested,  without  any  supporting  facts,  your 
statements  in  a  lecture  on  Gothic  architecture?" 

In  attempting  to  put  within  the  compass  of  one  volume 
an  introduction  to  world  politics,  it  has  been  necessary  to 
omit  much  of  interest  and  importance,  and  to  exclude, 
except  where  clearness  demanded  it,  historical  narrative. 
The  writer  confesses  frankly  that  his  sympathies  are  with 
the  smaller  nations  in  their  struggles  to  maintain  or  win 
independence,  and  that  he  believes  it  is  possible  to  use  "one 
weight  and  one  measure"  in  international  relations.  But 
he  has  tried  to  allow  the  facts  to  speak  for  themselves,  and 
urges  the  reader  to  do  the  supplementary  reading  indi- 
cated for  each  chapter.  References  have  been  given,  not 
as  sources,  but  as  guides  to  further  information.  In  select- 
ing them  different  points  of  view  and  the  general  avail- 
ability of  materials  have  been  taken  into  consideration. 
Some  books,  excellent  as  sources,  are  not  widely  circulated, 
or  are  not  written  in  the  condensed  form  demanded  by  the 
general  reader  or  student.  When  used  as  a  text-book,  the 
chapters  are  intended  to  acquaint  the  student  with  the 
skeleton  facts  upon  which  the  lectures  are  based,  to  amplify 


viii  PREFACE 

the  lectures  on  certain  points,  and,  above  all,  to  provoke 
discussion.  In  the  advanced  study  of  political  science  no 
text-book  can  take  the  place  of  lectures  and  class-room 
quizzes  and  comment  on  assigned  reading. 

If  British  statesmanship  and  officialdom  come  in  for  a 
larger  share  of  criticism  in  a  course  on  world  politics  than 
those  of  other  great  powers,  it  is  only  because  Great  Britain 
is  more  involved  overseas  than  any  other  power.  I  am  of 
pure  British  stock,  and  am  an  intense  admirer  of  the  civili- 
zation and  culture  that  are  my  heritage.  My  point  of  view 
is  in  no  sense  anti-British.  In  fact,  it  is  peculiarly  Anglo- 
Saxon.  From  our  ancestors  we  have  learned  to  lean  back- 
ward in  our  desire  to  be  fair  to  the  other  man  and  to  put 
ourselves  in  his  place.  The  most  precious  English  intel- 
lectual tradition  is  to  write  with  detachment  and  impar- 
tiality. In  the  atmosphere  of  passion  and  prejudice  born 
of  the  war  many  of  us  departed  from  our  moorings.  But 
we  are  finding  ourselves  again.  Facing  facts  and  holding 
to  common  ideals  of  liberty  and  justice  are  the  bases  of 
Anglo-Saxon  solidarity. 

I  can  not  adequately  express  my  appreciation  of  the 
help  and  light  in  the  preparation  of  this  volume  that  have 
come  to  me  from  unknown  friends  in  many  countries.  Ever 
since  1914  numerous  correspondents  have  been  pointing 
out  to  me  errors  of  fact,  or  have  entered  into  stimulating 
and  suggestive  discussion  provoked  by  statements  in  my 
books  and  magazine  articles.  All  this  has  been  grist  to  my 
mill.  My  friends  in  American,  British,  and  French  universi- 
ties have  given  me  encouragement  audi  equally  helpful 
criticism  and  admonition.  The  opportunities  for  personal 
investigation  in  different  parts  of  the  world  have  been  en- 
joyed through  the  constant  and  generous  interest  of  the 
late  James  Gordon  Bennett  and  of  Mr.  Rodman  Wana- 
maker.  Professor  William  Starr  Myers,  of  Princeton  Uni- 
versity, and  my  brother.  Professor  Oliphant  Gibbons,  of  the 
Buffalo  Technical  High  School,  read  the  manuscript.   Pro- 


PREFACE  ix 

f  essor  Frederic  Austin  Ogg,  of  the  University  of  Wisconsin, 
has  edited  manuscript  and  proofs  with  a  thoroughness  for 
which  I  can  not  express  too  highly  my  admiration  and 
thanks.  My  publishers  have  shown  the  interest  and  care 
that  long  years  of  happy  association  have  taught  me  to 
expect  from  them. 

Herbert  Adams  Gibbons 
Princeton,  May  1,  1922 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAOB 

I  The  Beginnings  op  World  Politics 3 

n  Nationalism  and  Steam  Power  (17S9-1848)    ...  17 

III  The  Rise  of  World  Powers  (1848-1878)    ....  30 

IV  French  Colonial  Expansion  (1830-1900)   ....  52 

V  British  Colonial  Expansion  (1815-1878)    ....  65 

VI     Consolidation  of  British  Power  in  the  Near  East 

(1878-1885) 83 

VII    The  Near  Eastern   Question    (1879-1908)     ...       96 

VIII    Russian  Colonial  Expansion  (1829-1878)   ....     113 

IX     Consolidation  of  Russian  Power  in  the  Far  East 

(1879-1903) 122 

X    Japan's  First  Challenge  to  Europe:  The  War  with 

China  (1894-1895) 130 

XI    The  Attempt  TO  Partition  China  (1895-1902)   .     .     .     139 

XII    Japan's    Second    Challenge   to   Eltjope:    The  Wap 

WITH  RussLi  (1904-1905) 158 

XIII  The  Revival  of  British  Imperialism  (1895-1902)     .     166 

XIV  Persia  and  the  Anglo-Russian  Agreement  of  1907    178 

XV    Egypt,  Morocco,  and  the  Anglo-French  Agreement 

OF  1904 185 

XVI    The  De\'elopment  op  the  German  Weltpolitik  (1883- 

1905) 195 

XVII    The  Franco-German  Dispute  Over  Morocco   (1905- 

1911) 207 

XVIII    The   Young    Turk   Revolution   and   Its   Reactions 

(1908-1911) 219 

XIX    Italian  Expansion  in  Africa  (1882-1911)   ....     228 

XX    The  Reopening  op  the  Near  Eastern  Question  by 

Italy  (1911-1912) 236 

xi 


Zll 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PAOI 

XXI    Intrigues  op  the  Great  Powers  in  the  Balkans 

(1903-1912) 246 

XXII     The  Balkan  War  Against  Turkey  (1912-1913)    .     .     254 

XXIII  The  Balkan  Tangle  (1913-1914) 261 

XXIV  The  Triple  Entente  Against  the  Central  Empires 

(1914)        272 

XXV    Italy's  Entrance  into  the  Triple  Entente  (1915)   .     283 

XXVI    The  Alinement  of  the  Balkan  States  in  the  Euro- 
pean War  (1914-1917) 294 

XXVII     China  as  a  Republic  (1906-1917) 305 

XXVIII  Japan's  Third  Challenge  to  Europe  :  The  War  with 
Germany  and  the  Twenty-one  Demands  on 
China  (1914-1916) 318 

XXIX     The  United  States  in  World  Politics   (1893-1917)     328 

XXX    The  United  States  and  the  Latin-American  Repub- 
lics (1893-1917) 340 

XXXI    The  United  States  in  the  Coalition  Against  the 

Central  Empires  (1917-1918) 358 

XXXII    The  Disintegration  of  the  Romanoff,  Hapsburg,  and 
Ottoman  Empires  through  Self-Determination 
Propaganda  (1917-1918) 367 

XXXIII    The  Attempt  to  Create  a  Leaglt:  of  Nations  at  Paris 

After  the  Defeat  of  Germany  (1919)  ....     381 

XXXrV    The  Refusal  of  the  United  States  to  Ratify  the 

Treaties  and  Enter  the  League  (1919-1921)   .      .     390 

XXXV    World  Politics  and  the  Treaty  of  Versailles  (1919- 

1922) 399 

XXXVI    World  Politics   and   the   Treaty   op   St.    Ger:main 

(1919-1922) 407 

XXXVII    World  Politics  and  the  Treaty  of  Trianon   (1919- 

1922) 416 

XXXVIII    World  Politics  and  the  Treaty  of  Neuilly   (1919- 

1922) 422 

XXXIX    World  Politics  and  the  Treaty  op  SE\TtES  (1920-1922)     428 

XL  The  Reestablishment  of  Peace  Prevented  by  Un- 
satisfied Nationalist  Aspirations  and  Divergent 
Policies  of  the  Victors   (1918-1922)    ....     442 


CONTENTS  xiii 

CHAPTER  PAQB 

XLI    The  Russian  Revolution  and  Its  Aftermath  (1917- 

1922) 457 

XLII    Overseas  Possessions  of  "Secondary  States"  (1815- 

1922) 474 

XLIII    French  Colonial  Problems  (1901-1922)     ....     483 

XLIV    British  Imperial  Problems    (1903-1922)    ....     494 

XLV    The  Foreign  Policy  op  Post-Bellum  Japan   (1919- 

1922)     . 514 

XLVI    The   Place  of  the  United    States   in   the  World 

(1920-1922) 522 

XLVII    Bases     of     Solidarity     Among     English-Speaking 

Peoples  (1922)    535 

XLVIII    The  Continuation   Conferences:   From  London  to 

Genoa  (1919-1922) 548 

XLIX     The  Washington  Conference  and  the  Limitation  of 

Armaments    (1921-1922) 561 

Bibliography 577 

Index 589 


MAPS 

PACnrO  PAGE 

Asia  at  the  End  of  the  World  War Title 

Africa  about  1850 30 

The  Spoliation  of  an  Asiatic  State  :  Siam  before  1893  and  after 

1910 60 

The  Great  Powers  in  China 142 

French  Cessions  to  Germany  in  the  Congo  :  1912 218 

The  Balkan  Peninsula  in  1914 268 

Africa  in  1914 404 

The  Stepping  Stones  from  Asia  to  Australia 516 


AN  INTRODUCTION  TO 
WORLD  POLITICS 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WOBLD  POLITICS 

WHEN  political  organisms  were  small  and  communi- 
ties self-sustaining,  problems  of  government  were 
not  complicated  by  considerations  of  foreign  policy.  At 
first,  travelers  were  killed  and  their  possessions  confiscated, 
unless  they  were  stronger  than  those  they  met.  On  sea, 
men  took  their  chances  with  pirates  as  with  the  weather. 
Until  means  of  transportation  and  a  guaranty  of  protec- 
tion were  furnished  them,  few  traveled  in  inland  countries. 
None  traveled  for  pleasure,  and  the  quest  of  knowledge  or 
gold  was  attended  by  great  and  constant  risks.  Later, 
when  means  of  transportation  increased  and  regular  routes 
were  established,  travelers  purchased  protection  by  paying 
tribute  to  the  strong.  And  strength  was  not  so  much  a 
matter  of  numbers  and  of  fighting  ability  as  of  geographical 
position.  Consequently,  there  was  virtually  no  intercourse, 
social  or  commercial,  between  peoples  of  different  blood, 
language,  customs,  and  religion. 

Before  the  Christian  era  the  history  of  ** civilization," 
as  we  understand  that  term,  was  developed  in  Mediterra- 
nean lands.  There  the  three  monotheistic  religions  origi- 
nated and  spread,  and  there  the  cultures,  the  written  lan- 
guages, and  the  social  and  political  background  of  modern 
Europe  were  created.    The  Egyptians  and  Chaldeans  and 

3 


4  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Assyrians  did  not  go  far  afield  in  their  wars.  The  Persians 
and  Greeks  invaded  each  other's  countries  mainly  as  ad- 
venturous explorers.  The  Phoenicians  and  Greeks  traded 
in  the  Mediterranean  and  founded  colonies  without  the 
urge  of  a  united  racial  impulse  behind  them.  Rome  did 
not  allow  Carthage  to  become  a  consolidated  empire;  and 
the  Greeks,  like  the  Italians  of  the  Middle  Ages,  instead  of 
standing  together  in  their  expansion,  exhausted  their  ener- 
gies in  fighting  each  other.  Although  the  Romans  colo- 
nized, it  was  rather  by  taking  aliens  into  partnership  and 
by  organizing  a  governmental  system  than  by  making  their 
own  race  dominant.  The  Roman  Empire  was  not  conceived 
in  the  spirit  of  ruling  the  world  for  the  benefit  of  the  Italian 
peninsula.  When  they  conquered  the  Greeks,  the  Romans 
succumbed  to  Greek  culture,  and  as  the  empire  grew,  Rome 
itself  did  not  remain  the  political,  much  less  the  economic, 
metropolis.  There  never  was  a  Roman  race  in  the  sense 
that  there  was  a  Greek  race  and  later  an  Arab  race. 

The  Roman  Empire  had  neither  geographical  entity  nor 
national  foyer.  Rome  did  not  mean  a  place  from  which  a 
race  had  come  and  which  was  the  heart  of  the  nation.  Pos- 
sessing no  common  economic  interests  and  no  consciousness 
of  oneness  of  blood,  the  peoples  of  the  Roman  Empire  were 
easily  weakened  by,  and  then  fell  prey  to,  the  migrating 
peoples  of  Europe  and  Asia.  Our  Teutonic  ancestors  col- 
onized Europe  by  subjugating  and  becoming  assimilated 
with,  if  not  by  actually  exterminating,  the  indigenous  in- 
habitants. As  soon  as  new  political  organisms  took  the 
place  of  the  defunct  Eastern  and  Western  empires,  migra- 
tion ceased.  Whole  races  no  longer  passed  from  Asia  to 
Europe  or  from  one  part  of  Europe  to  another.  In  the 
medieval  period  of  European  history,  migratory  conquests 
ended  in  every  part  of  the  continent  simultaneously  with 
the  appearance  of  stable  centralized  governments.  This 
was  accomplished  just  in  time  to  stem  Mongolian  and  Semi- 
tic invaders,  who  attempted  a  new  migration.     Only  the 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WORLD  POLITICS  5 

Balkans,  parts  of  Russia,  and  northern  Africa  passed  un- 
der the  domination  of  the  later  Asiatics. 

But  our  ancestors,  once  they  had  settled  in  their  new 
homes,  still  found  causes  for  war.  On  the  surface  the  wars 
were  feudal,  religious,  dynastic;  underneath  was  the  con- 
flict among  large  national  groups  in  the  process  of  forma- 
tion. Leaders  and  peoples  were  instruments  of  irresistible 
currents  of  whose  very  existence  they  did  not  know.  Placed 
within  certain  geographic  limits  and  welded  into  groups  by 
the  growth  of  common  economic  interests,  Europeans 
evolved  different  languages  and  characteristics,  and  thus 
became  separate  nationalities.  Except  in  a  few  specific 
instances  of  borderlands,  national  evolution  was  more  rapid 
and  more  thorough  in  western  Europe  than  in  central  and 
eastern  Europe. 

To  illustrate,  a  Scotchman  or  a  Welshman  may  retain 
his  pride  in  his  blood  and  perhaps  in  his  language,  but  he 
long  ago  became  a  Britisher  by  every  instinct  in  his  being. 
Proximity,  development  of  intercourse,  political  equality 
with  the  once  dominant  Englishman,  and,  above  all,  equal 
economic  opportunities  accomplished  this.  The  Irishman, 
on  the  contrary,  separated  by  water  from  other  Britishers, 
and  as  potently  by  different  cultural  and  religious  ideals, 
held  in  economic  and  political  subjection  to  the  dominant 
Englishman  by  means  of  a  land-owning  alien  element  and 
by  the  descendants  of  a  colony  of  alien  conquerors  in  one 
corner  of  the  island,  remained  unassimilated.  A  Breton  or 
a  Provengal  can  be  proud  of  his  origin  and  can  cherish  the 
cult  of  his  language  and  his  local  customs,  but  he  is  none 
the  less  a  good  Frenchman.  The  Breton  is  isolated  on  his 
peninsula  from  other  than  French  influences.  The  Proven- 
gal  is  cut  off  by  mountains  from  any  other  race  that  might 
have  influenced  his  national  self -consciousness.  In  this  way 
geography  has  played  the  most  important  role  in  assimi- 
lation. 

Border  peoples  in  central  and  eastern   Europe   were 


6  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

worked  upon  by,  and  became  successively  subjects  of,  rival 
national  groups.  In  eastern  Europe,  where  the  conquerors 
were  in  the  minority  and  of  the  ruling  class,  little  attempt 
was  made  at  assimilation  through  education  or  through  the 
creation  of  economic  interests  in  common  and  mutually 
realized  between  the  conquered  people  and  the  dominant 
alien  invaders.  Long  after  the  peoples  of  western  Europe 
and,  to  a  lesser  extent,  those  of  central  Europe  were  freed 
from  the  menace  of  migratory  invasions,  and  had  been  left 
to  themselves  to  develop  their  civilization,  the  peoples  of 
eastern  Europe  remained  under  Mohammedan  rule  or  con- 
tinued to  be  subjected  to  recurrent  Tartar  invasions.  An- 
other disruptive  influence,  which  has  persisted  through  the 
centuries  and  has  formed  a  barrier  from  the  Baltic  to  the 
Adriatic  between  peoples  whose  common  blood  and  lan- 
guage would  otherwise  have  caused  them  to  develop  a  com- 
mon nationality,  has  been  the  division  of  allegiance  be- 
tween the  Roman  and  the  Orthodox  churches.  Of  the  two 
most  powerful  branches  of  the  Slavs,  Poles  looked  to  Rome 
and  Russians  to  Constantinople.  The  Ukrainians  were 
divided,  and  Serbians  were  separated  from  Croats  and 
Slovenes. 

Early  in  the  history  of  modern  Europe,  international 
relations  became  important  from  an  economic,  as  well  as  a 
political,  point  of  view.  Commerce  led  to  the  establishment 
of  traditions  and  customs  in  the  dealings  among  nations. 
These  were  embodied  in  diplomacy  and  international  law. 
Treaties  of  friendship  and  commerce  were  sought  as  a 
means  of  reciprocally  guaranteeing  the  interests  of  na- 
tionals. When  migratory  conquests  ceased,  when  religious 
and  dynastic  wars  ended,  when  nationaUst  movements 
reached  and  accepted  the  limits  imposed  upon  them  by  ge- 
ography and  economics,  it  was  reasonable  to  suppose  that 
the  state  of  peace  attained  within  the  great  political  organ- 
isms might  be  extended  to  the  European  community  of 
nations. 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OP  WORLD  POLITICS  7 

But  when  Europeans  began  to  trade  overseas,  and  estab- 
lished colonies  and  companies  for  exploiting  newly  discov- 
ered regions  of  the  world,  competition  gave  rise  to  friction 
that  would  not  have  existed  had  the  European  nations  been 
able  to  continue  to  find  sources  of  prosperity  within  the 
borders  of  their  own  political  jurisdictions.  Wars  broke 
out  among  Spaniards,  Portuguese,  Dutch,  British,  and 
French,  which,  although  provoked  by  religious  and  dynastic 
questions  of  European  origin,  were  complicated,  extended, 
and  prolonged  because  of  the  interests  and  ambitions  of 
their  governments  and  private  companies  in  America  and 
Asia.  And  the  gains  and  losses  to  victors  and  vanquished 
have  proved  to  be  permanent,  and  have  influenced  the 
course  of  history  more  by  the  transfer  of  territories  and 
privileges  outside  Europe  than  by  boundary  changes  in 
Europe.  That  this  is  true  is  largely  the  result  of  develop- 
ments of  the  nineteenth  century.  As  long  as  sovereigns  and 
governments  fought,  with  mercenaries,  for  prizes  of  whose 
value  the  contending  peoples  were  dimly  if  at  all  aware, 
extra-European  rivalry  and  colonial  wars  did  not  have  a 
profound  influence  upon  the  relations  between  the  Euro- 
pean peoples.  A  great  change,  however,  began  to  take 
place  during  the  Napoleonic  era. 

The  rapid  increase  of  population  in  Europe,  with  the  ac- 
companying over-production  of  manufactured  articles  and 
over-consumption  of  raw  materials,  radically  changed  in- 
ternational relations.  Each  nation  felt  compelled  to  shape 
its  foreign  policy  according  to  the  opportunities  and  neces- 
sities of  acquiring  beyond  the  confines  of  Europe  areas  for 
colonization  and  new  markets.  This  situation,  unique  in 
history  because  the  conditions  that  created  it  have  not  be- 
fore existed,  gave  rise  to  a  new  branch  of  political  science — 
world  politics. 

World  politics  is  the  science  of  government  as  practised 
in  international  relations,  under  the  influence  of  real  or 
fancied  interests  in  other  than  neighboring  countries  or 


8  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

those  with  which  relations  of  reciprocal  advantage  are  nat- 
urally maintained.  All  nations,  for  their  security  and  ma- 
terial and  moral  well-being,  can  not  detach  their  domestic 
policies  from  those  of  nations  near  them  and  with  whom 
they  do  business.  But  when  they  become  friends  or  ene- 
mies because  of  rivalry  for  political  influence  and  economic 
advantages  in  regions  where  their  aim  is  to  enjoy,  exclu- 
sively if  possible,  the  fruits  of  economic  imperialism, 
friends  and  enemies  are  made,  not  by  natural  affinities  or 
by  good  or  evil  done  to  each  other,  but  by  considerations 
of  world  politics. 

It  is  not  impossible  to  build  up  a  thesis  for  the  beginnings 
of  world  politics  in  the  struggle  of  Syria  and  Egypt  over 
Syria  and  Palestine,  of  Greece  and  Persia  over  Asia  Minor, 
of  Athens  and  Sparta  over  Sicily,  of  Eome  and  Carthage 
over  Spain  and  the  hegemony  of  the  Mediterranean,  and, 
since  the  era  of  overseas  exploration,  in  the  wars  of  the 
original  maritime  and  colonial  powers.  But  before  the 
nineteenth  century  world  pohtics  had  comparatively  slight 
influence  upon  international  relations.  It  was  the  intro- 
duction of  steam  power  into  industry  that  made  overseas 
markets  profitable,  and  then  indispensable,  to  European 
nations.  The  use  of  steam  power  in  transportation  made 
it  possible  to  carry  manufactured  articles  to  foreign  mar- 
kets on  a  large  scale  and  to  fetch  raw  materials  and  food- 
stuffs. To  the  European  nations  prosperity  began  to  be 
dependent  upon  a  new  world-wide  division  of  labor,  in 
which  the  roles  of  manufacturer,  merchant,  banker,  and 
carrier  were  played  by  the  European  peoples. 

While  one  may  claim  that  international  relations  have 
always  been  affected  by  outside  interests  and  ambitions, 
it  was  not  until  the  nineteenth  century  that  Europe  began 
to  exploit  the  rest  of  the  world.  This  exploitation  is  a 
cause  as  much  as  a  result  of  surplus  population  and  capital. 
The  industrial  nations,  finding,  maintaining,  and  develop- 
ing new  markets,  at  the  same  time  exported  the  population 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WORLD  POLITICS  9 

and  the  capital  that  was,  in  part  at  least,  due  to  this  Exploi- 
tation. European  nations  came  more  and  more  to  vie  with 
one  another  for  exclusive  political  control  of  colonizing 
areas  where  white  men  could  live.  To  make  secure  the  hold 
on  colonies  already  acquired,  fortified  ports  of  call  were 
needed.  Hinterland  and  islands  were  annexed,  in  addition, 
to  protect  the  ports  of  call  or  to  prevent  other  nations  from 
installing  themselves  in  near-by  vantage-points.  Colonies 
and  protectorates,  in  turn,  began  to  create  a  demand  for 
goods  and  to  become  profitable  fields  for  investment.  This 
wealth  had  to  be  guarded ;  and,  as  there  was  no  disposition 
to  share  with  other  nations,  defense  of  the  sources  of  wealth 
began  to  be  a  heavy  tax  upon  those  who  had  accumulated  it. 

Unless  we  have  in  mind  the  colonial  situation  in  1815,  we 
can  not  rightly  estimate  the  foreign  policies  of  European 
peoples,  and  of  the  United  States  and  Japan  as  well,  since 
the  rise  of  nationahsm  and  steam  power.  We  must  know 
also  how  each  of  the  European  nations  won  and  lost  over- 
seas possessions  up  to  that  time. 

At  the  opening  of  the  modern  age,  the  Italians  were  the 
foremost  international  bankers,  traders,  explorers,  travel- 
ers, and  geographers.  Italian  princeUngs  ruled  over  states 
in  the  Greek  peninsula,  and  the  Italian  city-states  controlled 
the  trade  of  the  Adriatic,  ^gean,  and  eastern  Mediter- 
ranean. But  the  Italians  were  not  yet  on  the  road  to  poKti- 
cal  unity.  They  fought  one  another  up  to  the  point  of 
depleting  their  maritime  strength;  and,  even  after  the 
Ottoman  Turks  began  to  war  on  Christendom,  the  Italians 
continued  to  undermine  one  another.  The  Turks  conquered 
the  Balkans,  the  ^gean  islands,  Asia  Minor,  Syria,  Egypt, 
and  gradually  extended  their  power  around  the  Black  Sea 
and  across  northern  Africa.  The  Mediterranean  became 
and  remained  for  several  centuries  an  unsafe  and  unprofit- 
able sea  for  Europeans.  But  half  a  century  after  the  fall 
of  Constantinople  the  period  of  world  discovery  and  colo- 
nization began.    The  people  who  gave  birth  to  Christopher 


10  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Columbus  and  many  other  intrepid  and  successful  navi- 
gators had  no  part,  except  as  individuals,  in  the  expansion 
of  Europe  overseas,  and  their  last  city-state,  Venice,  was 
put  out  of  existence  by  the  treaty  of  Campo-Formio  in 
1797. 

The  Scandinavians,  also,  were  pioneer  explorers.  But 
their  poUtical  unity  was  broken  up  four  years  before  Co- 
lumbus discovered  America,  For  two  hundred  years  Danes 
and  Swedes  were  engaged  in  intermittent  warfare  against 
each  other.  Sweden,  on  the  whole  victorious,  attempted 
to  play  the  role  of  a  great  power.  She,  however,  did  not 
seek  an  empire  outside  of  Europe,  but  spent  her  strength, 
in  vain,  against  the  Hohenzollerns  and  Romanoffs.  The 
Norwegians  formed  a  union,  on  the  basis  of  equahty,  with 
the  Danes,  which  lasted  until  1814,  when  Norway  was 
joined  to  Sweden.  Sweden  and  Norway  founded  no  colo- 
nies. Denmark  colonized  Iceland,  made  settlements  on  the 
coast  of  Greenland,  and  took  possession  of  three  islands  in 
the  West  Indies — St.  Croix,  St.  Thomas,  and  St.  John.  The 
Danish  fleet  was  destroyed  by  the  British  at  Copenhagen 
in  1807.  Denmark  never  recovered  from  this  blow,  and 
she  had  no  part  in  the  colonial  expansion  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

Before  the  discovery  of  America  and  of  trade  routes  to 
the  east,  the  German  cities  of  the  Hanseatic  League  formed 
the  strongest  organization  for  international  commerce. 
But  geography  and  the  retarded  state  of  political  develop- 
ment in  Germany  were  factors  against  their  success  in  com- 
petition with  the  merchants  of  countries  better  situated 
from  a  maritime  point  of  view  and  more  advanced  politi- 
cally. The  Danish  peninsula  divided  the  coast  of  Germany 
and  made  a  formidable,  and  generally  hostile,  barrier  to 
egress  from  the  communities.  The  Holy  Roman  Empire, 
which  was  the  loose  Germanic  bond,  did  not  include  all  Ger- 
mans and  was  never  interested  in  the  future  of  the  German 
people  overseas.    The  empire  lived  on  until  1806,  and  at  the 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WOKLD  POLITICS  11 

peace  settlements  of  1814  and  1815  Prussia  and  Austria 
had  no  maritime  interests  to  safeguard  and  no  thought  of 
the  world  beyond  the  confines  of  Europe. 

Land-bound  Eussia  could  not  take  part  in  the  discovery 
and  development  of  world  trade  routes  and  colonies.  Po- 
land struggled  unsuccessfully  for  existence,  and,  after  hav- 
ing been  cut  off  from  the  sea,  disappeared  at  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  Hungarj^'s  outlets  to  the  sea  were 
controlled  by  the  Turks  and  the  Italians.  The  Balkan 
States,  which  were  incorporated  in  the  Ottoman  Empire 
during  the  century  of  the  discovery  of  America,  did  not 
emerge  from  bondage  until  the  nineteenth  century.  Bel- 
gium is  a  creation  of  the  post-Napoleonic  era. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  expansion  of  Europe  to  other 
continents,  then,  the  way  was  open  for  the  nations  of  west- 
ern Europe  bordering  on  the  Atlantic.  Geographical  po- 
sition had  much  to  do  with  the  ability  of  Spain,  Portugal, 
France,  Great  Britain,  and  Holland  to  forge  ahead  of  the 
other  nations  of  Europe  in  their  political  unification.  It 
had  everything  to  do  vdih  their  ability  to  follow  explora- 
tion by  colonization  and  to  preempt  the  extra-European 
world.  In  1815  these  five  European  countries  of  the  Atlan- 
tic coast  found  their  culture,  their  racial  stock,  and  their 
political  control  well  established  in  different  parts  of  the 
world.  The  Enghsh,  French,  and  Spanish  spoke  and  spread 
their  language  and  planted  their  political  institutions  in 
North  America,  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese  in  South 
America,  and  the  Dutch  in  South  Africa.  The  Dutch, 
the  French,  and  the  English  had  footholds  in  Guiana 
in  South  America.  All  five  were  established  in  Africa. 
English,  French,  and  Portuguese  were  in  India,  and  Dutch 
in  Ceylon.  The  Dutch  had  planted  their  flag  in  most  of  the 
East  Indian  islands,  and  the  other  four  peoples  were  there 
too.  The  English  had  settled  in  Australia  and  Tasmania. 
It  was  a  case  of  first  come,  first  served. 

But  those  who  came  first  did  not  in  every  instance  stay. 


12  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Among  the  five  colonizing  states  there  were  wars,  followed 
by  changes  of  title,  some  of  them  of  vital  importance  in 
their  influence  upon  the  history  of  the  world.  Spain  and 
Portugal  passed  their  zenith  and  became  decadent  before 
the  discovery  of  steam  power.  Holland  lost  the  mastery 
of  the  sea  and  her  choicest  colonies.  France  could  not  main- 
tain herself  against  Great  Britain  in  North  America  and 
India. 

With  the  exception  of  Uruguay,  Argentina,  Chile,  and 
Florida,  which  Spain  lost  before  the  large  movements  of 
population  from  Europe  to  America,  Spain  and  Portugal 
did  not  extend  their  dominions  over  regions  situated  in  the 
temperate  zone.  Their  colonies  were  countries  to  which 
Europeans  could  not  transplant  themselves  without  de- 
terioration of  stock.  Instead  of  sending  for  women  of  their 
own  race,  Portuguese  and  Spaniards  mixed  their  blood  with 
natives,  and  later  with  negroes  introduced  from  Africa. 
Spaniards  and  Portuguese  went  overseas,  not  to  seek  and 
establish  homes  in  a  new  country,  but  to  convert  the  heathen 
or  carry  away  existing  wealth.  The  Spanish  gravitated  to 
Mexico  and  Peru,  the  Portuguese  to  India  and  China  and 
Japan,  because  they  discovered  in  those  countries  ancient 
civilizations  whose  treasures  of  gold  and  precious  stones, 
of  silks  and  spices,  they  could  seize  and  carry  home.  In 
the  heyday  of  their  power  Spain  and  Portugal  were  repre- 
sented in  their  colonial  empires  by  missionaries  and  looters, 
not  by  colonists  and  traders.  They  had  little  to  sell  to  the 
countries  they  controlled  and  no  intention  of  settling  them 
on  a  scale  that  would  amount  to  a  migration.  Their  acqui- 
sitions did  not  attract  the  British  and  French.  The  Por- 
tuguese were  able  to  hold  their  colonies  by  infeodating 
themselves  to  the  English  from  the  beginning  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  a  relationship  that  has  not  been  dis- 
turbed in  two  hundred  years. 

With  the  exception  of  Louisiana,  which  passed  from 
France  to  Spain,  to  France  again,  and  finally  to  the  United 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WORLD  POLITICS  13 

States  in  1803-04,  Spain,  although  defeated  in  wars  several 
times,  managed  to  retain  title  to  most  of  her  colonies  until 
they  themselves  began  to  break  away  from  her. 

Colonial  rivalry  among  the  other  three  nations  was  on  a 
different  basis.  French,  Dutch,  and  British  staked  out 
territories  in  the  New  World  for  the  purpose  of  active 
colonization,  and  their  claims  overlapped.  The  Dutch 
picked  out  the  best  port  on  the  American  coast.  The 
French,  not  content  with  Canada,  attempted  to  extend  their 
control  over  the  hinterland  of  the  North  American  conti- 
nent from  the  Great  Lakes  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and 
included  in  their  claims  the  tributaries  of  the  Mississippi  to 
their  head-waters.  By  colonizing  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope 
and  by  succeeding  the  Portuguese  in  Ceylon,  the  Dutch 
made  a  bid  for  control  of  the  trade  routes  to  the  Far  East 
and  India.    The  French  challenged  the  British  in  India. 

From  Louis  XIV  to  Napoleon  I,  the  wars  by  which  Great 
Britain  acquired  all  of  France 's  colonial  empire  and  a  por- 
tion of  Holland's  arose  from  causes  within  Europe.  The 
extension  of  these  wars  to  other  parts  of  the  world  was  in- 
cidental,^ and  the  colonial  advance  of  Great  Britain,  marked 
by  the  successive  treaties,  can  not  be  regarded  as  the  ful- 
filment of  plans  and  hopes  of  statesmen.  Men  of  the  sev- 
enteenth and  eighteenth  centuries  could  not  have  realized 
what  these  gains  were  to  mean  to  the  British  Empire.  Ex- 
ceptions to  this  general  statement,  however,  may  be  taken 
in  regard  to  the  conquest  of  New  Amsterdam  in  1665,  and 
to  the  fighting  in  India  between  the  British  and  the  French. 

During  the  Napoleonic  wars  the  British  began  to  think 
of  the  advantages  of  a  victorious  peace  in  consolidating  and 

*  The  wars  between  the  British  and  French  in  America  were  provoked  and 
terminated  by  causes  arising  in  Europe,  with  the  exception  of  the  final  struggle 
that  eliminated  France  from  the  Ohio  Valley  and  Canada.  The  French  and 
Indian  War  (1754-63)  differed  from  King  William's  War  (1689-97),  Qiieen 
Anne's  War  (1701-13),  and  King  George's  War  (1744-48)  in  that  the  first 
fighting,  and  also  the  battles  that  decided  the  American  issues  of  the  war,  oc- 
curred on  American  soil.  However,  the  Seven  Years'  War,  as  it  was  known  in 
Europe,  powerfully  influenced  the  fortunes  of  the  fighting  in  America,  and  in  a 
very  real  sense  contributed  to  the  disappearance  of  French  power  in  America. 


14  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

adding  to  the  empire  that  was  being  built  up  throughout 
the  world.  The  contemptuous  reference  of  Napoleon  to  the 
British  as  '*a  nation  of  shopkeepers"  proves  that  during 
the  upheaval  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century  con- 
siderations of  world  pontics  were  entering  into  European 
diplomacy.  World  politics  certainly  influenced  British 
naval  and  military  activities,  while  continental  European 
nations  were  devoting  their  undivided  energies  to  keeping 
Napoleon  in  check.  By  the  peace  of  Amiens,  in  1802,  Great 
Britain  gave  back  to  France  and  her  allies  a  number  of 
choice  morsels  that  her  enterprising  naval  officers  and  over- 
seas expeditions  had  picked  up,  with  the  exception  of  Trini- 
dad, ceded  to  her  by  Spain,  and  Ceylon,  taken  from  Holland. 

The  battle  of  Trafalgar,  in  1805,  broke  forever  the  sea 
power  of  France  and  Spain,  and  gave  Great  Britain  a  free 
hand,  as  far  as  these  two  countries  were  concerned,  in  the 
extra-European  world.  Never  since  that  day  have  Spain 
and  France  been  able  to  make  effective  resistance  to  the 
extension  of  British  colonial  power.  The  events  of  the  last 
ten  years  of  the  Napoleonic  regime  played  squarely  into  the 
hands  of  British  colonial  aspirations.  Denmark  and  Hol- 
land were  forced  to  ally  themselves  with  France:  so  the 
British  seized  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  and  the  northern 
parts  of  Dutch  Guiana  permanently  and  destroyed  the  Dan- 
ish fleet.  Spain,  although  as  unwilling  an  ally  of  France  as 
other  European  states  after  1808,  suffered  as  much  abroad 
as  if  she  had  been  waging  war  voluntarily.  Portugal  saved 
her  colonies  by  the  flight  of  the  royal  family  to  Brazil,  and 
by  a  refusal  to  submit  to  the  French.  The  British  natu- 
rally refrained  from  operations  against  African  and  Asiatic 
territories  of  the  country  that  was  a  valuable  and  friendly 
base  for  them  in  the  Peninsular  War. 

After  the  battle  of  Wagram,  in  1809,  Napoleon  was  at 
the  height  of  his  power  in  Europe.  He  was  impotent,  how- 
ever, on  sea;  and  in  that  one  year  Cayenne,  Martinique, 
Senegal,  and  Santo  Domingo  were  lost,  and  in  the  follow- 


THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  WORLD  POLITICS  15 

ing  year  Guadeloupe,  Isle  Bourbon,  and  He  de  France.    In 
1811  the  British  occupied  Java. 

During  the  Napoleonic  wars  the  British  greatly  extended 
their  dominions  in  India  under  Lord  Cornwallis  and  Sir 
Arthur  Wellesley  (afterward  Duke  of  Wellington).  While 
the  Congress  of  Vienna  was  debating,  the  British  were  fight- 
ing a  war  with  the  Ghurkas  of  Nepal,  and  the  last  Mah- 
ratta  war  took  place  in  1817-18.  The  beginning  of  Great 
Britain's  west  African  empire  was  the  elevation  of  Sierra 
Leone  to  the  rank  of  cro^vn  colony  in  1808,  and  the  fighting 
with  the  French  over  Senegal  and  Gambia.  After  the  set- 
tlements following  the  collapse  of  Napoleon,  the  British  on 
the  west  coast  founded  Bathurst  in  1816.  When  the  Brit- 
ish took  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  they  decided  to  get  a  foot- 
hold on  the  coast  of  South  America  opposite  the  Falkland 
Islands,  where  they  had  acquired  title  by  agreement  with 
Spain  in  1771,  but  had  never  colonized.  This  would  give 
them  control  of  the  passage  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific, 
even  as  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  controlled  the  passage  from 
the  Atlantic  to  the  Indian  Ocean  and  Gibraltar  dominated 
the  strait  leading  from  the  Atlantic  into  the  Mediterranean. 
An  expedition  from  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  landed  in  the 
River  Plata  in  June,  1806,  and  captured  Buenos  Aires.  The 
inhabitants  were  required  to  swear  allegiance  to  George  III. 
The  Spaniards  demanded  independence  from  all  and  any 
European  sovereignty,  and,  when  it  was  refused  them,  na- 
tives and  Spaniards  together  revolted  and  compelled  the 
British  to  surrender.  Reinforcements  arrived  in  1807,  took 
Montevideo  by  assault,  and  marched  on  Buenos  Aires.  Al- 
though the  British  had  a  large  force  and  were  well  sup- 
ported by  the  fleet,  their  generals  lacked  courage  and  re- 
sourcefulness. They  got  into  a  muddle  and  surrendered, 
promising  to  evacuate  the  territory  of  Buenos  Aires  and 
Montevideo  as  well.  No  new  expedition  was  sent,  and  thus 
the  opportunity  was  missed  to  gain  in  South  America  what 
had  been  gained  in  every  other  continent. 


16  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

The  transfers  of  title  in  the  world  outside  of  Europe 
from  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  to  the  end  of 
the  Napoleonic  period  came  to  be  of  great  importance  in  the 
nineteenth  century  and  influenced  profoundly  the  rela- 
tions among  European  nations  from  the  act  of  Vienna 
(1815)  to  the  treaty  of  Versailles  (1919).  We  have  not 
space  to  go  into  the  details  of  the  treaties  of  Breda  (1667) ; 
Madrid  (1670);  Ryswick  (1697);  Utrecht  (1713);  Seville 
(1729);  Vienna  (1731);  Aix-la-Chapelle  (1748);  Paris 
(1763) ;  and  Amiens  (1802).  But  it  must  not  be  forgotten 
that  in  them  we  find  the  beginnings  of  world  politics. 


CHAPTER  n 

NATIONALISM    AND    STEAM    POWER    (1789-1848) 

THE  conception  of  racial  or  national  supremacy,  based 
upon  cultural  superiority  and  military  and  financial 
mastery,  originated  during  the  French  Revolution  and  the 
Napoleonic  wars,  and  was  developed  during  the  period  from 
1815  to  1848,  coincident  with,  the  birth  of  the  sense  of 
nationahty  in  Europe  and  the  introduction  of  steam  power 
into  industry  and  transportation. 

There  is  wide  difference  of  opinion  among  scholars  as  to 
the  period  in  the  development  of  nations  when  the  phenome- 
non of  national  self-consciousness  can  first  be  discerned. 
Some  historians  go  back  in  Spain  to  Ferdinand  and  Isa- 
bella; in  England,  to  Henry  VIII  and  Wolsey,  to  Eliza- 
beth and  the  Spanish  Armada,  or  to  the  fall  of  the  house 
of  Stuart;  in  France,  to  Joan  of  Arc  and  Charles  VII,  or 
Henri  IV  and  the  Guises;  in  Holland,  to  John  of  Barne- 
veld ;  in  Sweden,  to  Gustavus  Vasa.  It  is  generally  agreed 
that  national  self-consciousness  did  not  manifest  itself  in 
other  peoples  of  Europe  until  after  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  It  is  difficult  to  admit,  however,  that 
a  sense  of  nationality  was  in  more  than  an  embryonic  state 
in  any  country  before  the  people  gained  the  responsibiUties 
and  privileges  of  citizenship.  In  Great  Britain,  as  else- 
where, the  realization  of  the  responsibilities  and  the  ap- 
preciation of  the  privileges  of  belonging  to  this  or  that 
political  group  or  organization  began  to  dawn  upon  the 
common  people  between  1789  and  1815,  and  became  a  part 
of  their  being  between  1815  and  1848. 

Before  the  French  Revolution,  international  conflicts 
did  not  greatly  affect  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  peoples 

17 


18  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

except  in  the  localities  that  were  the  fields  of  battle.  Even 
where  the  fighting  took  place,  destruction  was  compara- 
tively slight.  The  armies  were  small,  and  composed  of 
professional  soldiers.  Tax  levies  for  armaments  were  not 
so  heavy  as  for  the  whims  and  pleasures  of  some  dissolute 
monarchs.  There  was  not  the  universal  sacrifice  involved 
in  obligatory  military  service.  The  people  were,  on  the 
whole,  indifferent  to  the  stakes  of  war.  Victory  or  defeat 
meant  so  little  that  we  frequently  find  nations  that  were 
enemies  one  year  allied  the  next.  In  the  century  and  a 
half  preceding  the  French  Revolution,  friends  changed  to 
foes  and  foes  to  friends  so  often  that  it  is  difficult  to  keep 
track  of  the  alliances.  The  wars  were  not  wars  of  peoples, 
nor  for  objects  that  combatants  and  tax-payers  understood 
and  that  they  kept  before  their  e^^es  as  incentives  and  com- 
pensations for  the  effort  they  were  making.  Proof  of  this 
is  supplied  by  contemporary  literature.  Bitterness  of  na- 
tion against  nation,  such  as  we  are  familiar  "svith  to-day, 
and  concern  for  victory  and  for  advantageous  terms  of 
peace,  are  lacking  in  chroniclers  of  current  events  from 
Pepys  to  Arthur  Young. 

A  German  king  who  could  speak  no  English  was  called  to 
the  British  throne,  and  he  and  his  successors  retained  their 
kingdom  in  Germany.  The  effort  made  by  Great  Britain 
in  the  American  Revolution  seems  now  to  have  been  greatly 
inferior  to  her  resources,  as  does  the  effort  of  France  to 
defend  Canada  in  the  previous  war.  Hessian  mercenaries 
fought  for  the  British  in  America,  and  there  was  little  or 
no  compunction  in  their  use.  Spain,  France,  and  Great 
Britain  did  not  employ  their  sea  power  to  make  the  Medi- 
terranean safe  for  their  nationals  against  the  pirates  of  the 
north  African  coast.  The  inhabitants  of  the  Mediterranean 
littoral  of  France  never  expected  their  king  to  avenge  the 
raids  of  the  Moors.  The  old  French  nobility  put  personal 
and  class  interest  above  national  feeling  to  the  extent  of 
leading  foreign  armies  into  their  country. 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  19 

The  Declaration  of  the  Eights  of  Man,  promulgated  at 
Paris  on  August  27,  1789,  was  the  beginning  of  a  new  epoch 
in  European  history.  The  pendulum  swung  to  the  left  and 
then  as  far  to  the  right,  reaction  following  anarchy.  But 
the  principles  of  the  Revolution  were  written  into  the  heart 
of  Europe.  In  every  European  country  democratic  evolu- 
tion took  the  form  of  national  self-consciousness.  France 
led  the  way.  When  the  newly  won  liberties  of  the  people 
were  threatened,  foreigners  became  national  enemies.  De- 
fense of  country  was  defense  of  liberty.  The  battles  of 
Valmy  and  Jemmapes,  in  1792,  were,  on  the  French  side, 
battles  of  the  French  people,  who  fought  to  keep  something 
precious,  and  were  conscious  of  so  fighting.  During  the  next 
twenty  years  Europe  was  transformed.  Wherever  Napoleon 
went  with  his  armies  he  appealed  to  peoples  against 
their  masters.  By  proclamations  and  emissaries,  he  sought 
to  capitalize  the  political  and  economic  situation  in  the 
countries  of  his  enemies,  with  a  view  to  weakening  their 
resistance  to  his  armies.  He  told  subject  races  that  the  hour 
of  emancipation  from  alien  rule  had  struck  and  admonished 
peasants  in  economic  servitude  that  the  moment  was  fa- 
vorable to  rise  up  against  their  oppressors.  Some  states 
were  forced  quite  against  their  interests  into  an  alhance 
mth  France.  For  a  time  Napoleon  fished  successfully  in 
troubled  waters.  Then  his  doctrines  were  turned  against 
himself.  The  teaching  was  accepted,  but  not  the  teacher. 
The  spirit  of  the  France  of  the  Revolution,  communicated 
by  French  invaders  to  other  peoples,  brought  about  the 
do^^^lfall  of  the  France  of  the  First  Empire.  The  battle  of 
Leipzig,  in  1813,  by  which  the  Sixth  Coalition  drove  Na- 
poleon back  into  France,  was  won  by  young  Germans  who 
reacted  to  and  gained  strength  from  the  new  nationalism, 
even  as  had  the  French  at  Valmy  and  Jemmapes. 

Statesmen  become  accustomed  to  the  sense  of  power.  Al- 
most invariably  the  leaders  of  nations  lose  in  the  course 
of  time  the  instinct  of  guiding  with  the  current  of  events, 


20  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

which  is  what  gives  them  their  high  position.  Wlien  they 
think  that  they  make  the  current,  and  that  they  are  able  to 
have  things  as  they  want  them,  the  mantle  passes  from 
their  shoulders.  The  sense  of  failure  that  usually  comes  to 
a  man  who  has  given  his  life  to  public  service  is  attributed 
by  himself  and  by  his  admirers  to  the  fickleness  of  the 
people.  The  reason,  however,  is  that  the  leader  stops  lead- 
ing. He  is  afraid  to  follow  his  vision  to  the  end.  He  wants 
to  consohdate  his  position.  He  becomes  an  advocate  of  the 
status  quo,  or  even  tries  to  set  back  the  hands  of  the  clock. 
This  was  the  state  of  mind  of  the  men  who  drew  up  the  act 
of  Vienna  in  1815.  Having  forced  France  to  return  to  her 
frontiers  of  pre-Napoleonic  days,  and  having  bargained 
with  one  another  for  the  spoils  of  victory,  they  decided  to 
combine  their  military  resources  in  an  effort  to  prevent 
the  peace  of  the  world  from  being  again  disturbed.  Fron- 
tiers were  to  remain  as  they  had  fixed  them,  and  peoples 
were  not  to  be  allowed  to  change  their  rulers  and  political 
institutions.  What  the  French  had  done  during  the  Revo- 
lution and  under  Napoleon  was  an  example  of  the  danger 
to  the  peace  of  the  world  arising  from  subversive  doctrines 
and  the  overthrow  of  existing  forms  of  government. 

In  their  consideration  of  international  relations  the 
statesmen  at  Vienna  refused  to  go  beneath  the  surface. 
In  their  minds,  all  that  was  necessary  to  establish  an  era 
of  good  understanding  in  Europe  was  common  agreement 
among  the  larger  states  to  preserve  the  status  quo,  terri- 
torially and  politically.  The  larger  states  were  to  avoid 
falling  out  with  one  another  by  not  having  any  more  spoils 
to  divide.  If  each  state  merely  preserved  its  frontiers, 
the  Vienna  conception  of  the  balance  of  power  would  be 
maintained.  If  weaker  states  were  bolstered  up  and  new 
political  entities  not  countenanced,  causes  for  conflict  would 
be  avoided. 

The  idea  itself  was  not  without  merit.  To  have  proposed 
and  accepted  the  principles  of  conference  and  cooperation 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  21 

among  nations  was  a  distinct  step  forward.  The  idea  was 
denatured,  however,  by  the  Umitation  of  its  benefits  to  a 
favored  class  in  a  few  favored  nations.  Its  static  basis,  and 
the  fact  that  Great  Britain  was  already  aware  of  the  neces- 
sity of  subordinating  her  continental  policy  to  extra-Euro- 
pean interests,  made  it  impracticable.  The  Holy  Alliance 
of  Russia,  Prussia,  and  Austria  was  expanded  to  include 
France  when  it  was  thought  that  the  Bourbons  were  defi- 
nitely reestablished  on  the  French  throne.  Then  five  suc- 
cessive conferences  were  held,  from  1818  to  1822,  at  Aix- 
la-Chapelle,  Carlsbad,  Troppau,  Laybach,  and  Verona,  and 
unsuccessful  attempts  were  made  by  the  four  powers  to 
suppress,  through  joint  military  action,  the  democratic 
movements  in  Germany  and  Italy,  to  maintain  the  integrity 
of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  and  to  help  Spain  keep  her  colonies 
under  control.  Nationalism  and  democracy,  however, 
working  hand  in  hand  and  inseparable  one  from  the  other, 
were  forces  that  could  not  be  mastered  by  Metternich  and 
his  associates.  They  did  not  know  how  to  use  them.  They 
were  broken  by  them. 

NationaHsm,  powerfully  aided  by  the  economic  changes 
wrought  by  steam  power,  brought  about  the  unification 
of  Germany  and  Italy,  the  disintegration  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  and  the  creation  of  the  Latin  American  republics. 
With  Europe  as  the  point  of  departure  and  the  chief  bene- 
ficiary, the  Aryan  race  reached  out  for  world  domination. 
For  a  hundred  years  the  pickings  were  fat,  and  Europe 
multiplied  and  prospered.  But  at  home  the  larger  coun- 
tries, gradually  embittered  against  one  another,  in  the 
struggle  for  world  markets  and  raw  materials,  by  the  spirit 
of  nationalism,  drifted  into  the  Armageddon  of  the  World 
War. 

In  the  decade  before  the  French  Revolution  Watt  and 
Boulton  began  the  manufacture  of  steam-engines  in  Bir- 
mingham. Adoption  of  the  new  device  for  industry  did  not 
begin  radically  to  affect  production  until  steam  power  was 


22  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  AVORLD  POLITICS 

employed  for  transportation.  The  use  of  steam-driven 
ships  began  in  the  second  decade,  and  of  steam-engines  on 
railways  in  the  third  decade,  of  the  nineteenth  century. 
Development  was  rapid.  Between  1830  and  1840  railways 
became  an  important  factor  in  the  economic  life  of  Great 
Britain,  France,  Belgium,  and  the  United  States.  France 
began  to  subsidize  railway  construction  in  1842,  Austria 
in  1838,  Prussia  and  Spain  in  1848,  Russia  in  1850,  and 
Portugal  in  1853.  In  south  Germany,  Italy,  and  Hungary, 
railway  development  was  slow,  owing  to  the  smallness  of 
the  states.  When  it  was  realized  that  economic  prosperity 
was  dependent  upon  railway  construction,  and  that  railway 
construction  would  not  advance  without  political  unity,  the 
unification  of  Germany  a^d  Italy  was  assured.  The  de- 
velopment of  railways  in  Europe  between  1825  and  1850 
made  possible  the  rise  of  industry  on  a  large  scale.  For  the 
railways  brought  coal  and  raw  materials  and  distributed 
manufactured  articles.  Industrial  workers  were  able  to 
concentrate  and  form  large  centers  of  population;  for 
railways  transported  them  to  their  work,  and  carried  food- 
stuffs to  them.  Steamships  brought  the  outlying  world  into 
touch  with  Europe,  as  railways  brought  the  countries  of 
Europe  into  touch  one  with  another. 

Coal  and  iron  became,  during  the  period  from  1815  to 
1848,  the  greatest  sources  of  wealth  and  military  power. 
The  science  of  war  was  transformed  as  industry  and  com- 
merce were  transformed.  And  as  the  two  considerations 
underlying  a  nation's  foreign  policy  are  security  and  pros- 
perity, statesmen  had  to  begin  to  think  in  terms  of  coal  and 
iron,  of  mines  and  factories,  of  railways  and  ships,  of  cen- 
ters of  population  and  coaling  stations,  of  foreign  markets 
and  raw  materials  and  food-stuffs.  International  relations 
had  to  be  adapted  to  the  new  problems  of  world-^vide  con- 
tacts. Men  could  be  taught  that  security  and  prosperity 
were  one  and  the  same  thing,  and  that  aggression  was  no 
longer  to  be  defined  in  terms  of  invasion  of  the  territory 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  23 

of  one's  country  or  other  physical  violence,  but  of  attack 
upon  rights  and  privileges  secured  in  any  part  of  the 
world. 

Expansion  of  the  franchise,  which  gave  the  mass  of  the 
people  a  voice  in  government,  made  it  necessary  to  heed 
public  opinion.  It  was  from  these  unfranchised  groups  who 
labored  with  steam  power  that  the  most  insistent  demands 
for  suffrage  came,  and  the  earliest  manifestations  of  public 
intelligence  among  working-men  were  in  the  factory  towns. 
The  cost  of  armaments  and  the  payment  of  war  bills  had 
to  be  justified.  Equally  important,  a  willingness  to  fight 
had  to  be  inculcated  in  the  people.  This  was  done  by  propa- 
ganda, carried  on  variously  through  the  schools  and  news- 
papers. A  new  nineteenth-century  interpretation  had  to 
be  given  to  dulce  et  decorum  est  pro  patria  mori.  In  the 
new  game  of  world  politics  hereditary  enemies  might  be 
allies,  and  dying  for  one's  country  was  to  be  done  mostly 
far  from  home.  Pride  and  national  honor  were  brought 
to  the  front  in  the  teaching  of  patriotism.  Ideals  of  civil- 
ization, *' bearing  the  white  man's  burden,"  were  empha- 
sized. 

But  if  one  goes  through  the  arguments  advanced  in  par- 
liamentary assemblies  to  win  support  for  strong  foreign 
policies  and  for  military  and  naval  expenditures,  it  wdll  be 
seen  that  statesmen  of  the  era  of  world  pohtics  rely  largely 
on  the  fear  and  cupidity  of  their  fellow  citizens.  We  must 
defend  this  or  that  which  we  have;  we  must  anticipate 
others  seizing  this  or  that ;  we  must  aid  this  or  that  country 
to  be  free,  and  forbid  this  or  that  country  to  shake  off  the 
yoke  of  its  oppressor;  we  must  join  forces  with  this  or  that 
group  of  powers ;  w^e  must  extend  our  sovereignty  or  sphere 
of  influence  here  or  there — even  though  we  have  no  direct 
cause  for  occupying  this  or  that  territory  or  for  fighting 
this  or  that  nation.  Why?  Because  if  we  do  not  we  shall 
be  attacked,  we  shall  lose  our  prestige  or  some  possession 
or  exclusive  interest,  and  as  a  result  our  national  set^urity 


24  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

will  be  jeopardized,  and  not  only  mil  our  world  markets 
not  be  increased,  but  we  shall  end  by  being  done  out  of  them 
altogether.  Thus  during  the  nineteenth  century  did  states- 
men argue,  and  thus  arose  distrust  and  enmity  among  na- 
tions, not  in  the  old  form  of  hatred  and  fighting  confined 
to  a  few  people,  but  as  an  entirely  new  sort  of  animosity, 
nations  standing  against  nations.  Looking  back  over  the 
wars  of  the  nineteenth  century,  we  often  find  nations  fight- 
ing, and  hatred  engendered,  over  questions  in  which 
only  investors  and  developers  and  traders  had  a  direct 
interest. 

During  the  period  under  survey  the  changes  in  industry, 
transportation,  and  armaments  were  still  in  their  infancy. 
The  analysis  just  given  may,  therefore,  seem  an  anticipa- 
tion of  conditions  in  the  period  from  1848  to  1918.  But 
it  is  not.  We  do  not  need  to  come  downi  beyond  the  genera- 
tion immediately  following  the  Congress  of  Vienna  to  find 
the  spirit  of  nationalism,  full-fledged,  at  work  in  interna- 
tional relations.  Our  illustrations  are:  the  movement  for 
independence  in  Latin  America ;  the  intervention  of  France 
in  northern  Africa ;  the  Greek  War  of  Liberation ;  and  Me- 
hemet  All's  secession  from  the  Ottoman  Empire. 

When  Napoleon  invaded  Spain,  expelled  the  roj^al  fam- 
ily, and  put  his  brother  Joseph  on  the  throne,  the  Spanish 
colonies  in  America  found  the  opportunity  that  many  of 
them  had  long  been  looking  for  to  follow  the  example  of  the 
United  States.  In  1810  Chile,  Uruguay,  Colombia  (which 
then  included  Ecuador  and  Venezuela),  Buenos  Aires  (Ar- 
gentina, Paraguay,  and  Bolivia) ,  and  Mexico  revolted.  Peru 
followed  in  1811.  In  1813  Bolivar  broke  the  Spanish  power 
in  South  America  by  driving  the  Spaniards  from  Caracas, 
and  Mexico  declared  her  independence.  These  changes  were 
not  recognized  by  Europe,  and  after  the  restorations  of 
1814-15  the  Holy  Alliance  proposed  to  force  the  colonies  to 
return  to  the  Spanish  allegiance.  How  to  accomplish  this 
was  debated  at  successive  conferences,  and  in  1822  the 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  25 

Congress  of  Verona  decided  upon  joint  measures,  which 
were  to  be  undertaken  simultaneously  with  the  invasion 
of  Spain  to  restore  Ferdinand  VII,  a  mandate  for  which 
was  given  to  France.  Fortunately,  Canning,  who  had  just 
become  head  of  the  British  Foreign  Office,  opposed  the 
proposition  to  restore  the  American  colonies  to  Spain. 
Without  British  consent  an  expedition  was  not  feasible, 
and  the  plan  was  dropped.  The  difference  of  opinion  1)6- 
tween  the  continental  powers  and  Great  Britain  enabled 
the  United  States  to  notify  the  nations  of  Europe  that  an 
attempt  to  extend  the  European  system  to  any  portion  of 
the  American  hemisphere  would  be  regarded  as  the  "mani- 
festation of  an  unfriendly  disposition  towards  the  United 
States. ' '  The  weakness  of  Spain  prevented  her  from  win- 
ning back  the  colonies  herself,  although  neither  Great 
Britain  nor  the  United  States  would  have  opposed  her  in 
doing  so.  The  failure  of  the  Verona  program  removed 
North  and  South  America  from  the  field  of  the  extension 
of  European  eminent  domain.  It  kept  the  United  States 
out  of  world  politics  for  more  than  seventy-five  years. 
Had  the  members  of  the  Holy  Alliance  gone  to  Central  and 
South  America  to  help  Spain,  they  probably  would  have 
found  pretext  for  staying  to  help  themselves. 

For  hundreds  of  j^ears  France  did  little  or  nothing  to 
protect  her  ships  and  her  nationals  from  the  Barbary  pi- 
rates in  the  Mediterranean.  It  seems  incredible  that  at  the 
very  time  when  Napoleon  was  going  from  triumph  to  tri- 
umph in  Europe  French  ships  were  being  captured  within 
sight  of  the  coast  and  occasional  raids  made  on  French 
soil  by  the  inhabitants  of  the  Mediterranean  African  coast. 
To  put  a  stop  to  this  and  to  embark  anew  upon  France's 
career  as  a  colonial  power,  the  French  entered  Algeria  in 
1830,  captured  Algiers,  and  after  seven  years  succeeded 
in  taking  Constantine.  In  1844  they  came  to  blows  with 
Morocco.  The  beginning  was  made  of  a  penetration  of 
Africa,  which  in  two  generations  brought  France,  at  her 


26  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

very  door,  sources  of  great  and  varied  wealth,  and  led  her 
by  a  devious  route  into  an  alliance  with  the  country  that 
had  taken  away  her  earlier  colonial  empire.  The  Algerian 
campaign  had  hardly  been  launched  when  the  Bourbon  dj^- 
nasty  fell.  But  Louis  Philippe  continued  without  inter- 
ruption the  colonial  policy  of  Charles  X.  This  showed  that 
foreign  policy  was  no  longer  a  matter  of  dynasty,  but 
had  entered  into  the  self-consciousness  of  the  French 
people. 

The  Greek  War  of  Liberation  is  the  first  chapter  in  a  long 
series  of  attempts  of  the  European  powers,  working  in 
concert,  to  sacrifice  the  aspirations  of  the  subject  races  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire  to  what  the  statesmen  of  these  powers 
believed  to  be  the  particular  interests  of  the  countries  they 
represented.  When,  in  1822,  at  the  Congress  of  Verona, 
the  Serbian  and  Greek  revolts  against  Turkey  were  dis- 
cussed, 'it  was  decided  that  diminution  of  Ottoman  sover- 
eignty could  not  be  tolerated,  owing  to  the  unwillingness  of 
any  power  to  let  any  other  power  get  control  of  emanci- 
pated territories.  The  prizes  that  might  fall  into  some 
one's  possession  were  so  valuable  that  all  thought  it  pref- 
erable to  maintain  the  status  quo  of  Turkish  rule,  however 
disgraceful  and  oppressive,  rather  than  risk  letting  another 
win  them. 

The  Serbians  revolted  first,  in  1804,  and,  although  they 
suffered  from  blood  feuds  among  their  leaders,  and  were 
not  recognized  at  Vienna,  Milosh  Obrenovitch  (successor, 
by  assassination,  of  the  original  hero  of  the  revolution)  se- 
cured from  the  sultan  the  title  of  prince  and  partial  recog- 
nition of  Serbian  autonomy  in  1820.  Because  Russia 
backed  the  Serbians,  Austria  and  the  other  powers  opposed 
their  pretensions.  The  next  year  the  Greek  insurrection 
broke  out  and  spread  from  the  Adriatic  to  the  ^gean. 
For  six  years  the  Greeks  fought  heroically  and  successfully 
held  off  the  Turks.  Despite  massacres  that  stirred  the  in- 
dignation and  won  the  sympathy  of  cultured  Europeans, 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  27 

French  and  British  statesmen  stood  out  against  interven- 
tion. They  feared  what  they  had  feared  in  regard  to 
Serbia.  Serbians  and  Greeks  belonged  to  the  Orthodox 
Church,  and  Russia  was  suspected  of  using  the  national 
movements  to  extend  her  political  influence  to  the  Mediter- 
ranean. 

Finally,  when  Russia  declared  that  she  would  have  to 
intervene.  Great  Britain  and  France  joined  to  make  the 
impairment  of  Ottoman  integrity  as  slight  as  possible  and 
to  prevent  the  Russians  from  posing  as  liberators.  The 
Turko-Egyptian  fleet  was  destroyed  by  the  French,  British, 
and  Russians  at  Navarino ;  when  the  Russians  declared  war 
against  Turkey,  the  French  sent  troops  to  the  Pelopon- 
nesus ;  and  when  Turkey  yielded,  her  loss  of  territory  was 
made  as  little  as  possible.  Thessaly,  Epirus,  and  the 
islands  of  the  ^gean,  which  had  given  most  and  suffered 
most  for  the  cause  of  independence,  were  left  under  the 
Turkish  yoke.  The  kingdom  of  Greece  was  constituted 
under  the  joint  protection  of  Russia,  France,  and  Great 
Britain.  The  Ionian  Islands  had  been  given  to  Great 
Britain  by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  and  it  was  felt  that 
from  this  vantage-point  Russia  could  be  prevented  from 
exercising  undue  influence  over  the  tip  of  the  Balkan 
peninsula. 

The  Occidental  powers  and  Austria  were  quickly  con- 
fronted with  a  new  attack  upon  the  Ottoman  Empire.  Me- 
hemet  Ali,  an  Albanian  adventurer  who  had  made  him- 
self master  of  Egypt  after  the  Napoleonic  invasion,  gave 
powerful  aid  to  Turkey  in  the  Greek  War  of  Liberation. 
After  the  disaster  of  Navarino  he  rebuilt  the  Egyptian 
fleet,  and,  dissatisfied  because  the  sultan  did  not  reward  or 
properly  recognize  his  services,  he  sent  his  brilliant  son, 
Ibrahim  Pasha,  to  conquer  Syria.  In  the  winter  of  1831-32 
Ibrahim  Pasha  conquered  Syria,  and  then  suddenly  occu- 
pied Damascus  and  marched  into  Asia  Minor.  He  won 
three  battles,  the  last  of  them  at  Konia,  north  of  the  Taurus 


28  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Mountains,  and  the  road  to  Constantinople  was  open.  His 
fleet,  cooperating  in  the  Mediterranean,  drove  the  Turks 
back  to  the  Dardanelles.  The  Russians  intervened  to  save 
Turkey,  and  announced  their  intention  of  sending  a  fleet 
and  an  army  to  protect  Constantinople.  To  prevent  this, 
the  French  and  British  also  intervened,  and  peace  was 
made  in  1833,  Turkey  ceding  Syria  and  Cilicia  to  Mehemet 
Ali  for  life  and  granting  him  the  hereditary  rulership  of 
Egypt. 

In  1839  the  Turks  tried  to  oust  Mehemet  Ali  from  Syria, 
and  were  defeated  by  Ibrahim  Pasha  at  Nisib.  The  Turk- 
ish fleet  went  over  to  the  Egyjjtians.  Mehemet  Ali,  sup- 
ported by  France,  demanded  of  the  sultan  hereditary  pos- 
session of  all  the  lands  under  his  military  control.  The 
British,  suspecting  France  of  aiming  at  the  control  of 
Egypt  and  Syria,  formed  an  alliance  with  Austria,  Prussia, 
and  Russia  to  defend  Turkey.  French  public  opinion 
clamored  for  war.  Had  France  been  strong  enough  to 
fight,  she  would  have  done  so.  For  the  sake  of  peace, 
Thiers,  who  had  been  conducting  French  policj^,  was  forced 
to  retire  and  was  succeeded  by  Guizot.  Going  ahead  with- 
out the  French,  the  British,  Austrians,  and  Turks  took 
Acre  and  forced  Ibrahim  Pasha  to  retire  to  Egypt.  Me- 
hemet Ali  lost  Syria  and  Cilicia,  but  was  compensated  in 
the  treaty  of  London,  which  recognized  the  autonomy  of 
Egypt  and  the  rulership  of  the  country  in  the  line  of 
Mehemet  Ali. 

The  French  were  mollified  by  the  return  of  Napoleon's 
body  from  St.  Helena.  The  reburial  in  the  Hotel  des  In- 
valides  was  the  occasion  of  a  remarkable  demonstration. 
The  effervescence  over  the  Egyptian  dispute  and  the  hero- 
worship  of  Napoleon  showed  that  the  French  had  forgotten 
1814  and  1815  and  were  ready  to  build  for  the  future  upon 
the  memory  of  former  glories.  Then  they  had  thought  of 
Europe;  now  they  were  thinking  of  the  great  world.  Na- 
poleon had  gone  to  Egypt  and  Syria  in  sailing-vessels,  and 


STEAM  POWER  (1789-1848)  29 

the  rich  commercial  advantage  of  French  influence  in  the 
Near  East  had  not  then  been  apparent.  But  in  1840,  with 
railways  and  steamshixos,  with  factories  and  coal  and  iron, 
the  French  began  to  see  what  was  in  store  for  the  nation 
Avith  a  world  vision.  Power  would  bring  wealth.  But 
other  European  nations  thought  as  France  did.  They,  too, 
were  striving  for  power. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  EISE  OF  WOELD  POWERS  (1848-1878) 

AT  Paris  in  January,  1919,  plenipotentiaries  of  twenty- 
seven  states  gathered  to  decide  upon  conditions  of 
peace  to  be  imposed  upon  Germany  and  the  allies  of  Ger- 
many. In  preliminary  private  conferences  the  representa- 
tives of  France,  Great  Britain,  Italy,  Japan,  and  the  United 
States,  without  so  much  as  ''by  your  leave,"  organized  the 
work  of  drafting  the  treaties  in  such  a  way  as  to  exclude 
the  other  states  from  any  real  voice  in  the  deliberations. 
**The  Principal  Alhed  and  Associated  Powers  with  general 
interests"  allotted  themselves  two  members  each  on  every 
committee  and  on  the  Council,  which  was  to  be  the  final 
court  of  decision.  "The  Secondary  Powers  with  particular 
interests"  were  granted  no  representation  on  the  Council, 
and  were  told  that  they  would  have  to  designate  five  mem- 
bers— to  represent  them  all  together — on  the  committees. 
Despite  vehement  protest  and  sulking,  this  plan  was  car- 
ried through.  The  great  powers  had  won  the  war  and 
would  be  responsible  for  enforcing  the  peace.  Therefore, 
it  was  argued,  they  must  keep  in  their  hands  the  right  to 
decide  upon  the  terms  of  the  treaties  and  the  right  to 
interpret  them  afterwards. 

This  was  not  a  new  idea.  It  followed  the  tradition  and 
practice  of  nineteenth-century  diplomacy,  begun  at  the 
Congress  of  Vienna  and  developed  at  the  congresses  of 
Paris  (1856)  and  Berlin  (1878).  The  only  change  was  the 
exclusion  of  Germany  and  Russia  and  the  inclusion  of  the 
United  States  and  Japan.  Because  of  the  size  of  their 
armies  and  navies,  and  their  success  in  using  them,  certain 
nations  have  long  assumed  the  privilege  of  setthng  ques- 

30 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  31 

tions  arising  from  war  according  to  their  own  interests 
and  at  the  expense  alike  of  defeated  nations,  of  weaker 
allied  nations,  and  of  neutrals.  During  the  hundred  years 
between  the  Napoleonic  wars  and  the  World 'War,  this 
privilege  had  been  gradually  extended  to  cover  every  ques- 
tion affecting  the  general  welfare  of  mankind.  The  world 
powers  were  alone  capable  of  waging  war;  hence  the  peace 
of  the  world  could  be  maintained  only  through  agreement 
among  themselves.  The  aim  of  diplomacy  was  to  satisfy 
the  world  powers ;  the  destinies  of  other  nations  and  races, 
their  liberty,  their  security,  their  prosperity,  their  general 
well-being,  were  subordinated  to  the  policies  and  ambitions 
of  the  world  powers. 

The  defect  in  the  scheme  lay  in  the  inability  of  the  world 
powers  to  satisfy  one  another.  They  fell  out  singly,  and 
then  sought  to  form  combinations.  From  coalitions  made 
for  particular  wars  and  terminating  automatically  when 
peace  was  signed,  they  were  led  into  alliances  contracted 
in  time  of  peace  to  protect  and  advance  their  interests  in 
different  parts  of  the  world.  New  causes  for  friction  arose, 
which  had  little  or  nothing  to  do  with  the  normal  relations 
between  nations. 

Before  1848  the  chief  concern  of  the  powers,  in  their  rela- 
tions with  one  another,  was  the  preservation  of  the  status  quo 
of  the  act  of  Vienna.  Monarchs  and  statesmen  were  afraid 
that  the  democratic  movement,  if  successful  in  other  coun- 
tries, would  react  upon  the  internal  situation  in  their  own 
country.  Neither  Eussia  nor  Austria  could  see  new  states 
born  of  the  revival  of  subject  races  without  feeling  that 
the  precedents  shook  the  foundations  of  their  own  power. 
The  breaking  away  of  Belgium  from  Holland  in  1830  was 
more  than  a  breach  of  the  act  of  Vienna.  It  gave  hope  to 
the  partitioned  Poles,  and  encouraged  the  fermentation  in 
the  Italian  and  Balkan  peninsulas.  The  separatist  move- 
ment in  Hungary  reacted  almost  as  dangerously  upon  Rus- 
sia as  upon  Austria.    But  after  the  failure  of  the  revolu- 


32  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tions  of  1848  the  powers  began  to  realize  that  their  chief 
danger  was  from  the  intrigues  of  neighboring  powers. 
Revolutionary  movements  could  hardly  be  successful  unless 
encouraged  and  supported  by  an  interested  outsider.  Sep- 
aratism was  doomed  to  impotence  if  the  nations  affected 
were  allowed  a  free  hand  to  suppress  it.  The  aid  given  by 
Russia  to  Austria  against  Hungary  in  1849  was  the  last 
attempt  to  attain  what  the  Holy  Alliance  called  its  main 
object,  i.  c,  international  cooperation  against  subversive 
internal  political  movements. 

The  revolutions  of  1848  were  weathered  everywhere  in 
Europe  except  in  France,  where  the  Orleans  dynasty  fell 
and  a  republic  succeeded  in  establishing  effective  adminis- 
trative control.  The  French  republicans,  however,  realized 
that  the  national  interest  required  continuing  the  foreign 
policy  of  the  ousted  regime.  Principles  and  ideals,  in  the 
industrial  era  that  was  just  dawning,  could  not  be  subor- 
dinated to  quixotic  sympathy  with  peoples  struggling  for 
the  same  principles  and  ideals  in  another  country.  Ac- 
cordingly an  army  was  despatched  to  Italy,  which  put  an 
end  to  Garibaldi's  Roman  republic  in  the  late  spring  and 
early  summer  of  1849.  It  was  the  same  test  as  that  of  1830. 
The  ministers  of  Louis  Philippe  did  not  interrupt  the  ex- 
pedition begun  by  the  ministers  of  Charles  X  in  Algeria. 
Moreover,  although  they  were  in  power  because  of  a  revo- 
lution undertaken  in  the  name  of  liberty,  they  resisted 
every  effort  of  generous-minded  men  to  have  France  in- 
tervene in  favor  of  the  Poles.  The  famous  response  to  a 
question  asked  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  about  Poland, 
* '  Order  reigns  in  Warsaw, ' '  has  never  been  forgotten.  Con- 
vinced of  the  necessity  of  a  foreign  policy  based  on  national 
interest,  the  French  people  thereafter  allowed  no  internal 
disturbances  or  changes  in  government  to  affect  the  min- 
istry of  foreign  affairs.  Imperial  or  republican,  clerical 
or  anti-clerical,  idealist  or  realist,  the  governments  of 
France  since  1848  have  made  moves  and  taken  positions 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  33 

in  international  politics  with  one  purpose,  to  protect  and 
increase  what  were  believed  to  be  the  commercial  interests 
of  France  abroad. 

This  new  attitude,  which  is  the  inciting  motive  in  world 
politics,  entered  into  the  aftermath  of  the  Revolution  of 
1848  in  Germany.  The  preliminary  parliament  in  Frank- 
fort decided  to  call  a  national  German  assembly  for  the 
purpose  of  making  a  constitution  for  a  new  German  Em- 
pire. The  troops  of  the  German  Confederation  were  loj^al 
to  the  principle  of  unity.  We  can  not  understand  the  in- 
volved struggle  in  the  German  states,  and  the  influences  at 
work  in  the  parliaments  of  Erfurt  and  Frankfort  in  1850, 
by  the  sole  factor  of  the  rivalry  of  Prussia  and  Austria 
for  hegemony.  Nor  can  we  consider  the  failure  of  the 
revolutionists,  most  of  whom  emigrated  to  the  United 
States,  as  due  to  the  single  cause  to  which  they  attributed 
it.  The  triumph  of  reaction  was  temporary.  The  great 
mass  of  the  German  people  did  not  abandon  the  revolution 
and  fro^vn  upon  republicanism  merely  because  of  an  in- 
herent conservatism.  The  new  industrialism,  and  the  vis- 
tas of  opportunity  opened  up  by  the  development  of  rail- 
roads and  ocean  commerce,  made  the  Germans  think  of 
unity  as  the  summum  honum.  It  is  the  commonly  accepted 
idea  that  in  the  generation  following  the  Revolution  of 
1848  a  ruthless  Prussia,  under  the  direction  of  Bismarck, 
stamped  out  her  own  liberties  and  those  of  her  neighbors 
for  the  glorification  of  a  dynasty  and  a  caste.  But  this  does 
not  take  into  account  the  irresistible  economic  current  that 
influenced  the  political  evolution  of  central  Europe  during 
the  third  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

Unless  the  Germanic  peoples  were  willing  to  sco  them- 
selves doomed  to  permanent  inferiority  in  the  new  Europe, 
they  too  had  to  unite  and  become  a  world  power.  Railroad 
construction  required  capital  and  continuity.  There  must 
be  free  access  to  coal  and  iron,  common  protection  against 
foreign  goods  for  the  development  of  industries,  and  a 


34  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

united  effort  to  bring  into  the  country  raw  materials,  and  to 
find,  all  over  the  world,  markets  for  manufactured  articles. 
The  Germans,  the  peoples  of  the  Danube,  and  the  Italians 
were  faced  with  entirely  new  economic  conditions  in  the 
struggle  for  existence.  There  was  no  alternative  to  the 
formation  of  large  political  organisms. 

The  unification  of  Germany  and  Italy  and  the  reorgani- 
zation of  the  Hapsburg  dominions  in  a  dual  monarchy  were 
events  beyond  the  power  of  statesmen  to  cause  or  prevent, 
or  even  greatly  to  control.  While  it  is  far  from  our  inten- 
tion to  attribute  the  unifying  processes  in  the  three  central 
European  countries  to  conscious  world  policy,  it  is  none 
the  less  true  that  when  European  powers  became  world 
powers  it  was  inevitable  that  there  should  be  a  Germany,  an 
Italy,  and  an  Austria-Hungary.  Although  it  is  doubtful 
whether  statesmen  or  people  appreciated  the  full  extent  of 
their  handicap  in  a  world  so  completely  transformed  since 
1815,  they  did  appreciate  the  handicap  of  lack  of  unity  upon 
the  development  of  industry  and  transportation  facilities 
within  their  own  borders  and  with  neighbors  of  the  same 
blood,  language,  and  culture.  In  the  process  of  erecting 
political  organisms  that  would  enable  the  peoples  of  central 
Europe  to  hold  their  own  with  those  of  western  and  eastern 
Europe  in  the  new  era  of  extra-European  expansion,  Ger- 
mans, Austrians,  Hungarians,  and  Italians  fought  one  an- 
other with  the  aid  of  the  already  unified  powers.  And  dur- 
ing the  same  period  the  inhabitants  of  the  United  States 
were  engaged  in  a  deadly  civil  war  for  the  same  purpose  of 
unification.  The  conflict  between  states'  rights  and  feder- 
alism came  to  a  head  in  the  New  World,  in  South  America 
as  well  as  in  North  America,  during  the  decade  when  the 
Old  World  was  successfully  forming  centralized  states. 
The  same  struggle  for  centralization  was  going  on  contem- 
poraneously in  Japan. 

Great  Britain,  France,  and  Russia  were  ready  to  meet 
the  new  conditions,  and  their  rise  as  world  powers  was  not 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  35 

marked  by  internal  or  external  convulsions.  They  were 
ahead  of  the  other  nations,  and  this  advantage  they  kept. 
Ultimately  they  formed  a  natural  alliance  to  defend  against 
the  later  claimants  the  privileged  position  won  through 
their  geographical  position  and  their  earlier  achievement 
of  political  unity. 

The  significant  events  in  the  preparation  of  the  other 
great  states  to  rise  to  world  power  may  be  briefly  reviewed. 

The  German  Empire  was  created  through  the  activities 
of  Prussia,  who  took  these  successive  steps:  (1)  founda- 
tion, in  1828  and  1833,  of  the  German  customs  union  (Zoll- 
verein),  which  Prussia  had  been  advocating  since  1818; 
(2)  reestablishment  of  the  German  Confederation  of  1815 
at  Dresden  in  1851;  (3)  war,  along  with  Austria,  against 
Denmark,  resulting  in  the  termination  of  Denmark's  rights 
over  Schleswig  and  Holstein  in  1864;  (4)  alliance  with  the 
smaller  north  German  states  and  Italy  against  Austria 
and  the  south  German  states,  which  were  defeated  in  the 
war  of  1866;  (5)  expulsion  of  Austria  from  the  Germanic 
Confederation,  followed  by  the  incorporation  of  some  small 
German  territories  in  Prussia;  (6)  establishment,  under 
Prussian  leadership,  of  the  North  German  Confederation, 
including  all  except  four  south  German  states;  (7)  war, 
with  the  aid  of  these  south  German  states,  against  France, 
resulting  in  the  seizure  of  Alsace-Lorraine  and  the  crea- 
tion of  the  German  Empire  in  1871. 

Italy  was  created  through  the  expansion  of  the  kingdom 
of  Sardinia  and  the  unofficial  activities  (sometimes  dis- 
avowed) of  the  revolutionist  Garibaldi,  involving  these  suc- 
cessive steps:  (1)  Sardinia,  with  France,  fought  Austria 
and  annexed  Lombardy  in  1859,  paying  France  by  giving 
up  Savoy  and  Nice;  (2)  Modena,  Parma,  and  Tuscany, 
expelling  their  rulers,  united  with  Sardinia  in  1860;  (3) 
Garibaldi  invaded  Sicily,  passed  to  the  mainland,  and  over- 
threw the  kingdom  of  Naples,  which  voted  to  join  the  king- 
dom of  Sardinia,  also  in  1860;  (4)  the  kingdom  of  Italy 


36  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

was  proclaimed  at  Turin  on  March  17,  1861;  (5)  Italy,  with 
Prussia,  fought  Austria,  and  won  Venetia  by  the  peace 
settlement  in  1866;  (6)  the  Italian  government  seized  Rome 
and  the  papal  states  in  1870,  when  the  defeat  of  France  by 
Germany  forced  the  withdrawal  of  French  troops  which 
had  been  protecting  the  temporal  power  of  the  papacy  dur- 
ing all  the  progress  of  Italian  unification. 

Austria-Hungary  was  created  through  the  expulsion  of 
Austria  from  the  Germanic  Confederation  by  Prussia  in 
the  war  of  1866.  Austria  had  been  greatly  weakened  by 
the  revolutions  in  Bohemia,  Hungary,  and  her  Italian  pos- 
sessions. The  Hungarian  revolution  was  crushed  with  the 
help  of  Russia  in  1849,  but  Lombardy  and  Venetia  were 
lost  in  the  wars  of  1859  and  1866.  When  Austria  lost  her 
position  in  the  Germanic  Confederation,  she  was  no  longer 
strong  enough  to  cope  with  the  different  nationalities  of 
the  Hapsburg  empire.  Consequently  the  German  element 
had  to  choose  between  the  dwindling  of  the  empire  and 
division  of  power  with  other  races.  In  1867  a  compromise 
was  made  with  the  Hungarians,  by  which  the  empire  was 
changed  into  a  dual  monarchy.  Hungary  and  Austria 
henceforth  had  the  same  ruler,  but  were  largely  independent 
of  each  other  in  internal  affairs.  The  two  equal  partners, 
in  turn,  were  left  to  make  what  compromises  or  arrange- 
ments they  saw  fit  with  other  racial  elements  within  their 
borders.  The  Austrians  oppressed  the  Czechs  and  Italians, 
but  gave  virtual  autonomy  to  the  Poles,  abandoning  to  them 
the  Ruthenians  (Ukrainians).  The  Hungarians  granted  a 
separate  diet  to  the  Croatians  at  Agram,  but  held  down  the 
Rumanians.  This  unique  political  organism  could  not  be 
called  a  nation  in  the  sense  that  Germany  and  Italy  were 
nations.  Its  political  existence  seemed  dependent  upon  the 
strength  of  Germany  and  the  weakness  of  the  Balkan 
States.  But,  although  torn  by  nationalist  movements, 
which  each  decade  became  more  threatening,  the  polyglot 
dual  monarchy  managed  to  survive  because  of  common 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  37 

economic  interests  and  the  advantage  to  the  various  peoples 
of  belonging  to  a  strong  political  organism  able  to  face 
the  competition  of  other  world  powers  and  to  provide  in- 
dustrial and  transportation  necessities. 

When  she  won  her  independence  from  Great  Britain, 
the  United  States  was  a  small  country  along  the  Atlantic 
coast,  containing  less  than  three  million  population.  From 
the  point  of  view  of  political  unity  and  of  development  of 
national  sentiment,  the  new  republic  w^as  fortunate  in  its 
cultural  and  linguistic  unity.  The  earlier  immigration 
was  mostly  English-speaking,  and  the  non-British  portion 
was  of  the  same  north  European  stock  as  the  original  set- 
tlers. There  were  no  serious  problems  of  racial  and  reli- 
gious antagonism.  But  the  Union  was  formed  on  the  basis 
of  a  voluntary  confederation  of  states  that  had  retained 
their  boundaries  and  had  surrendered  only  part  of  their 
governing  powers  to  the  federal  government.  Chiefly  be- 
cause of  the  slavery  question  the  states  of  the  North  and 
the  South  gradually  drifted  apart.  Because  it  was  not 
profitable,  slavery  disappeared  in  the  North.  In  the  South 
it  seemed  indispensable  to  agricultural  development.  As 
the  country  grew  by  penetration  and  settlement  westward, 
and  new  states  were  added,  in  most  of  which  the  holding 
of  slaves  was  against  public  sentiment,  the  South  fell  more 
and  more  into  the  minority  in  the  confederation.  Fearing 
being  overwhelmed  and  being  deprived  of  their  slaves, 
eleven  of  the  Southern  States  attempted  to  secede  from  the 
Union.  The  Northern  States  denied  the  alleged  right  of 
secession,  and  a  war  of  four  years  followed.  Great  Britain 
and  France  sympathized  mth  the  South,  but  did  not  inter- 
vene. The  North  won,  and  the  unity  and  perpetuity  of  the 
United  States  w^ere  finally  assured  in  1865. 

Japan  was  opened  to  foreign  intercourse  and  trade  by 
the  intervention  of  the  United  States.  From  1854  to  1858 
the  United  States,  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Russia  suc- 
ceeded in  negotiating  treaties  of  commerce  with  the  *'sho- 


38  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

gun, ' '  whom  the  powers  presumed  to  be  the  ruler  of  Japan. 
He  was  indeed  the  holder  of  secular  authority,  but  the  sho- 
gunate  was  a  usurped  position,  in  the  hands  of  feudal 
lords.  It  had  been  held  by  one  family  for  more  than  two 
hundred  and  fifty  years,  and  other  feudal  families,  who 
were  dissatisfied,  took  advantage  of  the  resentment  against 
the  shogun  aroused  by  his  yielding  to  foreigners  to  con- 
spire against  him.  The  result  of  the  ratification  of  treaties 
extorted  by  the  foreign  powers  was  the  resignation  of  the 
last  shogun  in  1867,  and  the  resumption  of  government  by 
the  lawful  sovereign,  the  mikado,  in  1868.  Civil  war  fol- 
lowed, in  w^hich  the  imperialists  were  successful.  In  1871 
feudalism  was  abolished,  and  Japan  started  upon  a  united 
political  life.  National  self-consciousness  was  born  of  the 
instinct  of  self-preservation,  and  Japan  began  to  imitate 
Occidental  civilization  in  order  to  become  a  world  power. 

While  the  Germans  and  Italians  were  accomplishing 
their  unification,  and  the  Austrians  and  Hungarians  were 
wrestling  with  the  problem  of  forming  a  state,  capable  of 
maintaining  itself  as  an  equal  among  the  world  powers,  in 
which  the  majority  of  the  population  was  of  other  races. 
Great  Britain,  France,  and  Russia  laid  the  foundations  of 
their  political  influence,  according  to  the  new  conception 
of  that  term,  in  the  Far  East  and  the  Near  East. 

Great  Britain  began  the  policy,  followed  later  by  the 
other  powers,  of  compelling  China  to  cede  territory  and 
commercial  privileges  by  force  of  arms.  In  1834  Emperor 
Taukwang,  alarmed  at  the  evil  effects  of  opium  introduced 
into  China  by  British  traders  from  India,  attempted  to 
revive  an  edict  prohibiting  the  opium  trade.  The  moment 
was  opportune,  and  no  international  agreement  was  vio- 
lated, for  the  exclusive  privilege  of  the  East  India  Com- 
pany had  just  expired.  But  the  trade  had  become  too  prof- 
itable to  lose.  After  several  years  of  negotiations,  the 
British  declared  war  on  China.  The  immediate  cause  was 
the  refusal  of  the  Chinese  government  to  reimburse  British 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  39 

merchants  for  the  destruction  of  more  than  twenty  thou- 
sand chests  of  opium  landed  on  Chinese  soil  in  defiance  of 
the  prohibition.  Great  Britain  demanded  also  that  the 
imperial  edict  be  revoked  and  that  trade  be  continued  and 
protected.  In  1842  China  was  compelled  to  sign  the  treaty 
of  Nanking,  by  which  the  island  of  Hong-Kong  was  ceded 
to  Great  Britain ;  five  ports  were  opened  to  British  trade ; 
and  an  indemnity  was  exacted.  A  supplementary  treaty, 
signed  the  next  year,  established  the  five  per  cent,  ad 
valorem  tariff,  and  forced  China  to  admit  the  principle  of 
extraterritoriality. 

In  1844  the  United  States  and  France  succeeded  also 
in  making  commercial  treaties  with  the  unwilling  Chinese. 
There  was  a  scramble  for  trade,  into  which  Russia,  begin- 
ning to  penetrate  from  Siberia,  entered.  In  1856  a  small 
Chinese  sailing-vessel,  owned  by  a  Chinese  but  flying  the 
British  flag,  was  boarded  by  Chinese  officers  hunting  for 
pirates.  Some  of  the  crew  were  arrested  and  the  flag  was 
pulled  down.  This  incident  led  to  a  new  declaration  of 
war  by  Great  Britain  against  China,  in  which  France 
joined.  The  Chinese  fleet  was  destroyed  in  May,  1857, 
and  Canton  was  captured  at  the  end  of  the  year.  There- 
fore, in  1858,  the  Chinese  signed  treaties  with  Great  Britain, 
France,  the  United  States,  and  Russia,  promising  a  measure 
of  protection  to  traders  and  ships,  which  the  authority  of 
the  Peking  government  was  unable  to  assure.  By  the 
treaties  of  Tientsin  in  June,  1858,  the  number  of  treaty 
ports  was  increased,  French  sovereignty  in  Indo-China  was 
recognized,  and  the  Amur  Province  was  ceded  to  Russia. 
When  a  British  ambassador  attempted  to  go  to  Peking  in 
1859,  and  was  fired  at.  Great  Britain  and  France  renewed 
the  war,  marched  on  Peking,  burned  the  Summer  Palace, 
and  made  the  Chinese  ratify  the  treaty  of  Tientsin,  agree 
to  tolerate  Christianity,  pay  an  indemnity,  and  receive 
resident  ambassadors  at  Peking.  In  the  meantime,  in  1858, 
to  avenge  the  death  of  a  missionary,  the  French  declared 


40  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

war  against  the  king  of  Anam.  Saigon  was  occupied,  and 
Anam  became  French. 

While  Great  Britain  and  France  were  fighting  China, 
Russia  succeeded  in  getting  title  to  the  territory  north  of 
the  Amur,  and  when  the  treaties  were  amplified  at  Peking 
in  1860  the  Eussian  minister,  posing  as  the  savior  of  China, 
persuaded  the  Chinese  government  to  cede  the  maritime 
province,  east  of  the  Usuri  River,  in  which  Russia  had  al- 
ready established  certain  ** rights."  In  1871  Russia  began 
anew  her  encroachment  upon  China  by  announcing  that  she 
had  annexed  the  province  of  Kulja  in  the  interior  "until 
the  Chinese  power  should  be  reestablished  in  that  region. ' ' 
Eventually  China  ceded  most  of  Kulja  to  Russia,  and  paid 
an  indemnity  to  boot.  China  has  not  been  free  from  foreign 
occupation  and  exploitation  since  her  first  acquaintance 
with  Occidental  civilization. 

The  beginnings  in  Japan  were  the  same.  But  the  Jap- 
anese reacted  in  a  different  way  from  the  Chinese.  An 
American  fleet  first  opened  Japan  to  foreign  commerce  in 
1853.^  The  French,  British,  and  Russians  made  commer- 
cial treaties  in  1854  and  1855,  follomng  closely  the  treaty 
between  Japan  and  the  United  States.  These  were  broad- 
ened in  1858  to  secure  unrestricted  commerce.  In  1862  the 
British  avenged  the  death  of  an  Englishman  in  a  brawl  by 
bombarding  Kagoshima  and  exacting  an  indemnity.  In 
1863  American,  Dutch,  and  French  vessels  anchored  in  a 
forbidden  spot  at  Shimonoseki.  After  due  warning  they 
were  fired  upon.  This  resulted  in  a  reprisal  bombardment, 
followed  by  negotiations  for  an  indemnity.  The  next  year 
Great  Britain  joined  the  United  States,  France,  and  Hol- 
land in  a  second  bombardment,  and  aided  in  collecting  a 
large  indemnity.  After  twenty  years,  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, recognizing  the  shamefulness  of  the  proceeding, 

^  This  is  the  commonly  accepted  date,  but  in  reality  it  is  more  correct  to  say 
that  Japan  began  her  international  commercial  relations  as  a  result  of  the 
second  visit  of  the  American  fleet  in  1854. 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  41 

returned  the  American  portion  of  the  indemnity  to  Japan. 
But,  as  we  have  seen,  during  this  period  the  mikado  was 
regaining  his  power  and  uniting  his  people  around  the 
throne.    Japan  rapidly  became  too  strong  to  be  exploited. 

In  the  Near  East  the  rise  of  world  powers  was  marked  by 
three  wars  of  Russia  against  Turkey,  in  1828,  1854,  and 
1877,  each  occasioned  by  the  announced  intention  of  Russia 
to  free  from  Ottoman  rule  the  Christian  races  subject  to 
Turkey.  The  other  powers,  especially  Great  Britain,  sus- 
pected Russia  each  time  of  wanting  to  destroy  the  Otto- 
man Empire  for  the  purpose  of  gaining  an  outlet  to  the 
Mediterranean  and  becoming  the  dominant  power  in  the 
eastern  Mediterranean  and  Persia.  Both  of  these  objects 
were  considered  by  Great  Britain  a  menace  to  her  naval 
power  and  to  India. 

Of  the  first  war  we  have  already  spoken.  To  prevent 
Russia  from  obtaining  control  of  Constantinople,  Great 
Britain  and  France  joined  with  her  in  compelling  the  Turks 
to  recognize  the  independence  of  Greece,  and  thus  became 
co-guarantors  with  Russia  of  the  Greek  kingdom.  This 
was  accomplished  at  the  Conference  of  London  in  1830, 
which  modified  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Adrianople,  con- 
cluded between  Russia  and  Turkey  in  the  previous  year.  In 
addition,  the  principalities  of  Moldavia  and  Wallachia, 
on  the  Danube,  were  made  autonomous.  We  have  also 
spoken  of  the  intervention  of  the  powers  in  1840  to  prevent 
Mehemet  Ali  from  detaching  from  the  sultan  the  Arabic- 
speaking  portions  of  the  Ottoman  Empire. 

In  1853  Czar  Nicholas  I,  assigning  misgovernment  and 
persecution  as  the  grounds  for  his  action,  demanded  of  the 
Sublime  Porte  that  the  right  be  granted  to  Russia  to  pro- 
tect the  Christians  of  the  Greek  Church  in  the  Turkish  em- 
pire. In  private  conversation  with  the  British  ambassador 
at  Petrograd,  the  czar  admitted  that  his  object  was  to  make 
Serbia,  Bosnia,  Bulgaria,  and  the  Danubian  principalities 
independent  states  under  Russian  protection.     This,  he 


42  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

thought,  would  require  a  provisional  occupation  of  Constan- 
tinople by  a  Russian  army;  and  he  intimated  that  Russia 
would  not  oppose  the  acquisition  of  Crete  and  Egypt  by 
Great  Britain.  Since  Napoleon  III  had  recently  come  to 
the  throne  of  France,  and  was  presumably  unacceptable  to 
the  British,  he  beheved  that  an  alliance  between  France  and 
Great  Britain  was  impossible,  while  Austria  owed  her  sal- 
vation to  Russia  for  the  intervention  against  the  Hun- 
garian revolutionists  four  years  earlier. 

Nicholas,  whose  country  had  been  the  least  affected  in 
all  Europe  by  the  economic  changes  since  his  succession  to 
the  throne  in  1825,  did  not  realize  how  public  opinion  in 
other  countries  (there  was  little  in  his  own)  was  begin- 
ning to  mix  business  with  sentiment.  Neither  Austrians 
nor  Italians,  although  sworn  enemies,  could  aiford  to  al- 
low Russia  to  ensconce  herself  in  the  Balkans  and  come 
down  to  the  Adriatic.  Prussia,  building  up  the  German 
customs  union  (Zollverein)  and  looking  forward  to  the  new 
possibilities  of  trade  routes  to  the  east  by  railway  and 
steam  transportation  on  the  Danube,  wanted  no  Slavic  bar- 
rier between  central  Europe  and  the  East.  France  was  the 
traditional  protector  of  the  Catholic  Christians  of  the  Ot- 
toman Empire,  who  predominated  in  Syria,  and  considered 
herself  the  custodian  of  the  holy  places  in  Palestine.  The 
French  had  dreams  also  of  silk  and  cotton  and  other  riches 
in  Cilicia,  Syria,  and  Egypt.  Napoleon  III  needed  a  war 
to  establish  his  dynasty  and  to  enable  France  to  throw  off 
the  consequences  of  the  treaties  of  1814  and  1815;  while 
Lord  Palmerston  made  Queen  Victoria  see  that  prejudice 
should  not  stand  in  the  way  of  receiving  the  nephew  of 
Bonaparte  and  his  plebeian  bride. 

When  the  Russians  occupied  the  Danubian  principalities 
Great  Britain  and  France  sent  a  fleet  to  the  Bosphorus. 
After  months  of  vain  parley,  the  two  powers  declared 
war  upon  Russia,  allying  themselves  with  Turkey  in  March, 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  43 

1854.  Prussia  and  Austria  declared  that  the  passage  of 
the  Balkans  by  Eussia  would  be  considered  an  act  of  war. 
Nicholas  withdrew  his  troops  from  the  Danube,  but  the 
French  and  British,  with  several  regiments  of  Turks, 
landed  a  large  expedition  in  the  Crimea.  Prussia  and  Aus- 
tria stationed  armies  on  the  frontier  of  Russia  in  an  atti- 
tude of  watchful  neutrality.  Cavour,  prime  minister  of 
Sardinia,  persuaded  Victor  Emmanuel  I  to  join  the  alli- 
ance and  send  fifteen  thousand  men  to  take  part  in  the  siege 
of  Sebastopol.  After  a  year  of  costly  fighting,  the  Crimean 
War  ended  with  Russia  suing  for  peace.    Nicholas  I  died  in 

1855,  and  was  succeeded  by  Alexander  II. 

Since  it  was  recognized  that  all  the  powers  had  an  in- 
terest in  the  Near  Eastern  settlement,  it  was  agreed  to 
make  the  treaty  with  Russia  the  work  of  an  international 
conference,  which  would  decide  moot  questions  of  interna- 
tional relations  that  had  arisen  since  the  Congress  of 
Vienna.  The  Congress  of  Paris  met  on  February  25,  1856, 
and  included  the  plenipotentiaries  of  France,  Great  Britain, 
Russia,  Sardinia,  Austria,  Prussia,  and  Turkey.  It  was 
the  first  appearance  of  Sardinia  at  the  council  table  among 
the  great  powers.  Nor  had  Turkey  ever  before  been  in- 
vited to  sit  with  the  European  powers. 

The  peace  of  Paris,  signed  on  March  30,  1856,  restored 
the  fortress  of  Kars,  on  the  frontier  of  Armenia,  to  Tur- 
key, and  the  Crimea  to  Russia;  southern  Bessarabia,  the 
outlet  of  the  Danube,  was  ceded  by  Russia  to  Moldavia, 
which,  with  Wallachia,  received  autonomy  under  the  guar- 
anty of  the  powers;  the  autonomy  of  Serbia  was  recog- 
nized ;  the  Black  Sea  was  neutralized,  even  to  the  war-ships 
and  fortifications  of  the  countries  on  its  littoral;  an  inter- 
national commission  was  created  to  control  navigation  of 
the  Danube;  and  the  Ottoman  Empire  was  admitted  '*to 
participate  in  the  public  law  and  concert  of  Europe,"  the 
powers  engaging  collectively  to  guarantee  ''the  indepen- 


44  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

dence  and  the  territorial  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire," 
and  the  sultan  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  his  subjects 
"without  distinction  of  race  or  creed." 

In  three  conventions  annexed  to  the  main  treaty,  Great 
Britain,  France,  and  Russia  agreed  upon  the  neutrality 
of  the  Aland  Islands,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Gulf  of  Finland, 
in  peace  and  war ;  the  six  powers  and  the  sultan  reaffirmed 
the  ancient  rule  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  closing  the  Dar- 
danelles and  Bosphorus  to  foreign  ships  of  war,  unless 
Turkey  herself  should  be  at  war ;  and  Russia  and  Turkey 
specified  the  number  and  armament  of  coast-guard  ships 
in  the  Black  Sea. 

Shortly  after  the  peace  of  Paris  was  signed,  the  seven 
contracting  nations  proposed  to  the  other  nations  of  the 
world  common  adherence  to  new  rules  regarding  maritime 
international  law.  The  declaration  of  Paris,  signed  on 
April  16,  1856,  was  the  outcome  of  this  attempt  to  reach 
an  understanding  upon  the  principles  that  should  regulate 
warfare  on  sea.  Privateering  was  abolished ;  enemy  goods 
on  neutral  vessels  were  not  to  be  confiscated,  miless  contra- 
band according  to  an  agreed  schedule;  and  a  blockade,  in 
order  to  be  binding,  must  be  effective.  The  United  States 
refused  to  sign  the  declaration  because  it  did  not  also  for- 
bid the  capture  of  private  enemy  vessels.  But  many  na- 
tions signed  before  the  end  of  1856,  and  Japan  in  1886. 
International  jurists  regard  the  declaration  of  Paris  as  an 
important  step  forward  in  the  progress  of  the  "family  of 
nations."  But  historians  must  reluctantly  note  that  it  has 
been  violated  by  the  signatories  whenever  its  observance 
has  conflicted  with  their  interests.  In  the  study  of  world 
politics  we  shall  often  find  treaties  and  international  con- 
ventions breaking  down  when  put  to  the  test.  On  paper 
many  advances  in  the  law  of  nations,  with  a  view  to  safe- 
guarding private  property  and  ameliorating  the  conditions 
under  which  wars  are  fought,  seem  to  denote  a  gradual  ad- 
vance of  civilization.    In  practice  the  agreements  have  not 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  45 

stood  in  the  way  of  the  nation  that  believed  it  had  the  force 
to  violate  them.  Seventj-five  years  of  discussion,  mostly 
quibbhng,  prove  that  the  right  or  wrong  in  the  interpreta- 
tion of  international  law  has  been  determined,  not  by  ju- 
rists, but  by  the  statesmen  of  powers  victorious  in  war. 
Since  the  rise  of  world  powers  these  powers  have  rarely  al- 
lowed, in  their  relations  either  with  one  another  or  mth 
neutrals  or  weaker  states,  treaty  clauses  and  agreements  to 
stand  between  them  and  policies  they  have  believed  it  es- 
sential to  follow  in  order  to  win  wars. 

The  Crimean  War  had  a  profound  influence  upon  the  rise 
of  the  world  powers.  It  was  the  first  European  war  fought 
by  the  British  after  the  House  of  Commons  became,  through 
the  Reform  Act  of  1832,  a  body  in  which  the  grooving  busi- 
ness interests  had  adequate  representation.  The  bloody 
sacrifices  of  the  war  awakened  in  England  a  widespread 
interest  in  foreign  policy  and  a  determination  to  de- 
fend and  extend  British  possessions  overseas.  This  was 
sho^ra  in  the  remarkable  response  of  public  opinion  to  the 
challenge  of  the  Sepoy  mutiny  in  India  during  the  follow- 
ing year,  and  also  to  the  stubbornness  of  China  about 
granting  tolerable  trading  conditions  to  Europeans  in  the 
same  year.  The  British  were  willing  to  fight  in  India  and 
China  as  they  had  fought  in  the  Crimea.  The  Congress  of 
Paris  gave  Napoleon  III  the  prestige  and  power  he  had 
expected  from  his  participation  in  the  Crimean  War  and 
prepared  French  public  opinion  for  intervention  in  Italy 
three  years  later,  Prussia  delayed  joining  the  other 
powers  in  the  Congress  of  Paris.  She  came  in  only  when 
she  was  assured  that  her  participation  would  not  offend 
Russia  and  that  her  presence  was  necessary  if  she  hoped 
to  share  in  what  one  might  call  the  by-products  of  the 
congress. 

The  treaty  of  Paris  was  a  factor  whose  importance  in 
hastening  the  unification  of  Italy  and  Germany  should  not 
be  underestimated.    The  article  neutralizing  the  Black  Sea 


46  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

was  fatal  to  the  security  and  prosperity  of  Russia.  It  was 
signed  under  duress,  and  the  czar's  government  immedi- 
ately laid  plans  to  repudiate  it.  Austria  and  France  had  to 
be  weakened  so  that  they  could  not  a  second  time  work 
with  Great  Britain  to  prevent  Russia's  development  as  a 
world  power.  During  the  next  fifteen  years  this  was  ac- 
complished. Germany  and  Italy  were  the  beneficiaries; 
Prussia  was  the  instrument.  From  the  Congress  of  Vienna 
to  the  Congress  of  Paris,  Russian  diplomacy  had  helped 
Austria  keep  the  Italian  states  from  uniting.  After  the 
Crimean  War  this  policy  was  reversed.  France  in  1859 
and  Prussia  in  1866  fought  Austria  and  made  possible  the 
unification  of  Italy.  Russia  allowed  Prussia  to  expel  Aus- 
tria from  the  German  Confederation  in  1866,  and  refused 
to  intervene  or  to  intercede  when  Prussia  and  the  other 
German  states  conquered  France  in  1870.  For  the  second 
time  an  Alexander  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  a  Napo- 
leon, who  had  crossed  the  path  of  Russia,  driven  from  his 
throne. 

When  the  Germans  laid  siege  to  Paris,  Russia  addressed 
to  the  powers  a  note  denouncing  the  Black  Sea  clauses  of 
the  treaty  of  Paris,  and  declared  that  the  czar  proposed  to 
resume  his  ''sovereign  rights"  in  the  Black  Sea.  Prussia 
said  nothing.  France  was  preoccupied.  Great  Britain 
and  Austria-Hungary  were  loud  in  their  protests.  But, 
not  being  willing  to  fight  without  the  aid  of  France  and  at 
least  the  assurance  of  the  neutrality  of  Prussia,  the  British 
and  Austrians  contented  themselves  with  insisting  that  a 
change  in  the  treaty  of  Paris  could  be  made  only  by  inter- 
national consent.  On  March  13,  1871,  the  treaty  of  London 
abrogated  the  Black  Sea  clauses  of  the  treaty  of  Paris; 
and  Russia  was  once  more  able  to  begin  to  threaten  the 
integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire. 

The  attempt  to  limit  the  world  activities  of  a  great  nation 
by  forcing  a  one-sided  treaty  upon  one  world  power  by  a 
coalition  of  other  world  powers  had  failed.     The  other  pur- 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  47 

pose  of  the  treaty  of  Paris,  i.  e.,  to  prevent  the  emancipa- 
tion of  subject  nationalities  in  the  Ottoman  Empire  be- 
cause their  freedom  might  lead  to  conflicts  between  the 
powers  for  commercial  supremacy  in  the  Near  East, 
failed  also. 

After  the  Congress  of  Paris,  Moldavia  and  Wallachia 
voted  the  ''union  of  the  principalities  in  a  single  neutral 
and  autonomous  state,  subject  to  the  suzerainty  of  the 
sultan,  and  under  the  hereditary  and  constitutional  govern- 
ment of  a  foreign  prince."  The  powers  answered  that 
the  principalities  must  remain  separate,  as  provided  in 
the  treaty  of  Paris.  Moldavia  and  Wallachia  defied  the 
powers,  and  constituted  the  principality  of  Rumania  in 
January,  1859.  A  native  nobleman  was  elected  prince,  but 
in  1866  was  replaced  by  Prince  Carol  of  Hohenzollern- 
Sigmaringen,  a  cousin  of  the  king  of  Prussia.  The  powers 
refused  to  recognize  the  new  sovereign,  just  as  they  had 
refused  to  recognize  the  union  itself.  But  they  accepted 
the  fait  accompli,  and  fifty  years  later,  when  the  World 
War  broke  out,  this  Hohenzollem  w^as  still  on  the  Ruma- 
nian throne. 

The  reforms  promised  when  Turkey  was  admitted  into 
the  family  of  European  nations  at  Paris  did  not  material- 
ize. On  the  contrary,  misrule  and  oppression  increased, 
until  the  breaking-point  was  reached  in  1875,  when  the 
Balkan  peoples  rose  in  revolt.  Russia  again  wanted  to 
intervene,  and  in  1876  secured  the  cooperation  of  Austria, 
Germany,  France,  and  Italy.  The  demands  for  reform 
were  presented  in  what  is  known  as  the  Berlin  Memoran- 
dum. The  British  not  only  refused  to  join  in  the  memo- 
randum, but  sent  their  fleet  to  anchor  at  the  Dardanelles. 
This  both  prevented  common  pressure  upon  Turkey  and 
deterred  the  Russians  from  acting  independently.  Des- 
perate and  left  to  their  own  resources,  Serbia  and  Monte- 
negro declared  war  upon  Turkey,  in  aid  of  the  Bosnians 
and  Herzegovinians  already  in  revolt.    The  Bulgarians, 


48  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

who  had  been  completely  submerged  by  the  Turks  for 
nearly  five  hundred  years,  rebelled.  Terrible  massacres 
followed.  A  year  of  diplomatic  effort  was  fruitless. 
Russia,  for  the  third  time,  went  to  the  assistance  of  the 
Balkan  Christians.  Rumania  joined  Russia.  Once  more 
the  Russians  took  Kars,  and  after  a  long  delay  at  Plevna 
they  crossed  the  Balkans  and  advanced  to  the  gates  of 
Constantinople.  The  British  fleet  passed  the  Dardanelles. 
Parliament  made  a  large  grant,  and  when  the  Russians 
dictated  to  the  Turks  a  drastic  treaty  at  San  Stefano  on 
March  3,  1878,  freeing  the  Balkan  peoples.  Great  Britain, 
backed  by  Austria,  gave  Russia  the  alternative  of  war  or 
a  revision  of  the  treaty  by  a  conference  of  the  powers. 

The  treaty  of  San  Stefano  made  Serbia,  Montenegro, 
and  Rumania  independent,  and  gave  them  additional  ter- 
ritory; created  an  autonomous  Bulgaria;  and  stipulated 
definite  reforms  for  the  protection  of  the  Bosnians  and 
Herzegovinians  in  Europe  and  the  Armenians  in  Asia. 
Russia  was  ceded  new  territories  in  Transcaucasia,  includ- 
ing the  port  of  Batum.  The  boundaries  provided  for  were 
far  from  perfect,  and  they  did  not  satisfy  any  of  the  Balkan 
peoples.  But  the  settlement  was  a  distinct  step  forward 
in  the  emancipation  of  Christians  from  Mohammedan  mis- 
rule. This,  however,  was  a  secondary  consideration  with 
the  British  and  Austro-Hungarian  statesmen,  who  were 
willing  to  let  the  Christians  suffer  rather  than  run  the  risk 
of  seeing  the  Balkans  pass  under  Russian  influence.  As 
at  the  time  of  the  Crimean  War,  the  British  Parliament 
was  ready  to  fight  to  check  the  advance  of  the  world  power 
of  Russia  where  it  would  conflict  with  the  world  power  of 
Great  Britain.  Disraeli,  the  British  prime  minister,  put 
it  thus: 

*'You  have  a  new  world,  new  influences  at  work,  new  and 
unknown  objects  and  dangers  with  which  to  cope.  .  .  .  The 
relations  of  England  to  Europe  are  not  the  same  as  they 
were  in  the  days  of  Lord  Chatham  or  Frederick  the  Great. 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  49 

The  Queen  of  England  has  become  the  Sovereign  of  the 
most  powerful  of  Oriental  States.  On  the  other  side  of  the 
globe  there  are  now  establishments  belonging  to  her,  teem- 
ing with  wealth  and  population.  .  .  .  These  are  vast  and 
novel  elements  in  the  distribution  of  power.  .  .  .  What  our 
duty  is  at  this  critical  moment  is  to  maintain  the  Empire 
of  England." 

In  1856  Russia,  defeated  in  war,  had  to  go  to  Paris  and 
allow  the  other  powers  to  decide  upon  the  solution  of  the 
Eastern  question  according  to  their  interests.  Victorious 
in  war,  Russia  hardly  fared  better  at  the  Congress  of  Ber- 
lin. Under  the  guidance  of  Bismarck,  who  presided  over 
the  congress,  Germany  chose  to  stand  by  Austria-Hungary 
rather  than  by  Russia.  Without  German  support,  Russia 
could  not  resist  the  other  powers.  Hence,  her  only  terri- 
torial gains,  outside  of  getting  back  from  Rumania  the 
strip  of  Bessarabia  that  she  had  been  forced  to  cede  to 
Moldavia  in  1856,  were  in  Transcaucasia.  Rumania  was 
compensated  by  being  given  the  Dobrudja,  between  the 
Danube  and  the  Black  Sea,  at  the  expense  of  Bulgaria. 
The  independence  of  Rumania,  Serbia,  and  Montenegro 
was  recognized.  Bulgaria,  however,  was  put  back  under 
the  Turks,  and,  further,  while  her  autonomy  was  assured, 
an  artificial  division  was  made  of  the  territories  mostly  in- 
habited by  Bulgarians.  Autonomous  Bulgaria  was  given 
frontiers  resting  on  the  Balkans  and  the  Danube.  South 
of  the  Balkans,  the  province  of  Eastern  Rumelia  was  con- 
stituted, mth  Philippopolis  as  its  capital — an  artificial 
creation,  wholly  separated  from  Bulgaria,  but  ^vith  a  Chris- 
tian governor  named  by  the  sultan.  Bulgaria  was  cut  off 
from  the  ^gean  Sea,  and  the  Bulgarians  and  Greeks  of 
Macedonia  were  returned  to  Turkish  rule,  as  were  the 
Armenians  of  Asia  Minor,  without  guaranties. 

The  treaty  of  Berlin  was  signed  on  July  13, 1878.  France 
got  nothing  by  it.  To  Italy  it  meant  a  check  to  the  pan- 
Slav  dream  of  expansion  to  the  Adriatic.    Austria  was 


50  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

allowed  to  occupy,  nnder  indefinite  terms,  Bosnia  and 
Herzegovina,  and  to  keep  a  military  garrison  in  the  Sanjak 
of  Novibazar.  Germany  asked  for  no  tangible  spoils,  but 
laid  the  foundations  for  her  later  friendship  with  the  Turks 
and  for  the  Drang  nach  Osten.  Great  Britain  once  more 
blocked  Eussian  designs  upon  the  Ottoman  Empire  and 
prepared  the  way  for  the  occupation  of  Egypt,  which  had 
become  essential  to  the  British  Empire — from  the  world- 
politics  point  of  view — since  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Mediter- 
ranean had  been  connected  by  railway  and  canal.  By  a 
separate  agreement  with  Turkey  (signed  on  June  4),  of 
which  the  other  powers  at  first  knew  nothing,  England  was 
*'to  occupy  and  administer"  the  island  of  Cyprus  as  long 
as  Russia  kept  Kars  and  Batum.  Since  Lord  Salisbury 
and  Count  Schouvaloff  had  already  arrived  at  an  agree- 
ment concerning  Kars  and  Batum,  of  which  the  Turks  knew 
nothing,  the  Cyprus  convention,  while  ostensibly  concluded 
to  maintain  the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  was  a 
step  toward  destroying  it. 

The  Congress  of  Berlin  made  an  honest  effort  to  find  a 
solution  of  the  Near  Eastern  question  that  would  avoid  a 
general  European  war.  It  was  accepted  that  no  power 
could  keep  out  of  the  scramble  for  Ottoman  lands,  should 
the  empire  break  up.  There  was  the  same  anxiety  as  at 
Paris  in  1856  and  at  Vienna  in  1815  to  lessen  as  much  as 
possible  the  disturbing  effect  of  the  creation  of  new  states 
in  the  relations  between  the  great  powers.  The  suspicion 
of  interestedness  and  of  desire  to  secure  exclusive  political, 
and  hence  economic,  advantages,  which  was  manifested 
against  Russia  after  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano,  became  the 
attitude  of  all  the  powers  in  regard  to  help  rendered  any- 
where at  any  time  by  a  single  power  to  a  smaller  or  weaker 
state.  The  duty  of  the  statesman,  as  defined  in  the  quota- 
tion of  Disraeli  given  above,  was  to  think  of  every  political 
event  and  threatened  change  of  the  status  quo,  no  matter 
where  it  occurred,  in  the  light  of  the  interests  of  his  own 


THE  RISE  OF  WORLD  POWERS  (1848-1878)  51 

nation.  In  an  age  of  steam  power  and  world  markets  geo- 
graphical position  and  propinquity  no  longer  justified  a 
claim  of  superior  or  special  interests  of  a  country  in  the 
solution  of  pohtical  problems  such  as,  in  other  epochs  of 
history,  would  not  have  been  contested.  At  least,  the  ex- 
pansion of  a  nation  to  adjacent  territory  would  not,  under 
the  earlier  conditions,  have  led  to  war  or  the  threat  of  war 
on  the  part  of  far-off  nations. 

With  the  rise  of  world  power  the  field  of  anxious  and 
even  aggressive  diplomatic  activities  of  European  nations 
began  to  cover  the  world.  And  as  population  and  industry, 
mihtary  strength  and  wealth,  did  not  remain  the  exclusive 
prerogative  of  European  nations,  and  as  the  European 
powers  continued  to  rival  and  checkmate  one  another,  the 
rise  of  world  powers  in  Europe  was  followed,  in  the  genera- 
tion after  the  Congress  of  Berlin,  by  the  rise  of  world 
powers  in  America  and  eastern  Asia. 


CHAPTER  IV 

FEENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900) 

WHEN  we  compare  the  treaties  of  Paris  (1814), 
Vienna  (1815),  and  Franldort  (1871)  with  the 
treaty  of  Versailles  (1919),  we  realize  the  difference  the 
era  of  world  politics  has  made  in  the  aims  of  statesman- 
ship. The  industrial  era  has  brought  us  to  the  point  of 
seeking  exclusive  advantages  for  our  own  commercial  in- 
terests at  the  expense  of  competitors ;  hence  the  victors  in 
the  twentieth-century  war  exclude  the  vanquished  from 
every  privilege,  political  or  economic,  outside  their  own 
country,  not  hesitating  even  to  confiscate  the  private 
property  of  enemy  nationalists.  A  century  ago,  although 
France  before  the  fall  of  Napoleon  had  already  lost  most 
of  her  colonial  empire,  she  was  not  despoiled  of  every- 
thing by  the  victorious  allies.  In  America  she  was  left 
St.  Pierre  and  ]\liquelon,  valuable  for  fishing  off  the  banks 
of  Newfoundland ;  Guadeloupe  and  Martinique  in  the  West 
Indies;  and  a  share  of  Guiana  on  the  northeast  coast  of 
South  America.  Her  five  colonies  in  India,  which  had  been 
occupied  by  the  British  since  1793,  were  handed  back  to 
her.  She  was  allowed  to  keep  the  island  of  Reunion  in 
the  Indian  Ocean  east  of  Madagascar,  and  was  confirmed 
in  her  possession  of  the  mouth  of  the  Senegal  River  in 
west  Africa. 

From  1815  to  1870,  with  the  notable  exception  of  Algeria, 
the  French  made  little  effort  to  rebuild  their  colonial  em- 
pire. Algeria  was  conquered  between  1830  and  1847.  In 
the  last  years  of  Louis  Philippe  they  began  to  stake  out 
claims  in  the  South  Sea  islands,  and  they  made  a  settlement 
for  a  naval  port  of  call  at  the  mouth  of  the  Gabun  River 

52 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  53 

in  Africa  in  1845.  Under  Napoleon  III  the  pacification 
of  Algeria  was  continued,  and  contact  began  with  the  Moor- 
ish tribes.  There  was  some  activity  also  in  Senegal,  and 
on  the  coast  of  Somaliland  Obok  was  purchased  in  1862 
as  a  check  to  the  British  occupation  of  Perim.  The  most 
important  colonial  achievement  of  Napoleon  III  was  the 
foundation  laid  for  the  creation  of  Indo-China  by  interven- 
tion in  Cochin-China  in  1861  and  in  Cambodia  in  1862.  The 
extra-European  activities  of  France  before  the  disastrous 
war  with  Prussia  were,  however,  mostly  negative.  From 
the  time  of  Mehemet  Ali,  the  French  had  an  advantage 
over  other  powers  in  Egypt.  They  conceived  and  financed 
the  building  of  the  Suez  Canal,  but  allowed  it  to  pass  out 
of  their  hands.  They  cooperated  with  Great  Britain  in 
fighting  China,  but  got  no  tangible  gain  like  Hong-Kong. 
The  Crimean  War  brought  them  only  trouble.  They  at- 
tempted to  use  their  navy  in  the  Persian  Gulf,  but  did  not 
succeed  in  more  than  postponing  British  control  of  Zan- 
zibar and  Muscat.  Napoleon  III  intervened  in  Syria  in 
1860  and  caused  those  responsible  for  the  massacre  of 
Christians  to  be  hanged  at  Damascus.  But  he  got  no 
definite  political  concessions. 

At  Frankfort,  in  1871,  the  victorious  Germans  thought 
only  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine.  They  could  have  compelled 
France  to  renounce  her  titles  in  Africa  and  Asia.  But, 
mthout  vision  of  what  the  next  generation  was  going  to 
show  were  the  real  needs  of  united  Germany,  Bismarck  did 
not  even  attempt  to  get  from  France  a  recognition  of  Ger- 
many's right  to  expand  in  Africa  and  Asia.  On  the  con- 
trary, he  encouraged  the  French  to  devote  their  efforts  to 
the  creation  of  a  new  colonial  empire,  and  especially  to 
extend  their  influence  along  the  Mediterranean  coast  of 
Africa.  The  first  line  of  activity  was  expected  to  involve 
the  French  so  deeply  outside  of  Europe  that  they  would 
accept  as  permanent  the  new  frontier  in  the  Vosges;  the 
second  was  expected  to  keep  open  a  breach  with  the  Ital- 


54  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ians,  which  was  already  wide  because  of  France's  defense 
of  the  temporal  power  of  the  papacy. 

From  1871  to  1914  colonial  ambitions  played  a  dominant 
role  in  the  internal  and  international  politics  of  the  Third 
Republic.  The  destiny  of  France  and  the  personal  for- 
tunes of  her  leaders  were  largely  determined  by  overseas 
developments  and  ever  ts.  Back  in  1840,  when  Thiers  gave 
way  to  Guizot  because  Louis  Philippe  decided  not  to  fight 
Great  Britain  over  the  question  of  Mehemet  Ali  and  Egypt, 
a  cabinet  crisis  due  to  world  politics  was  unique.  Under  the 
Third  Republic  it  became  a  frequent  occurrence.  Through 
her  colonial  expansion  France  became  the  ally  of  her 
hereditary  enemy,  Great  Britain.  She  built  up  a  standing 
army  of  Africans  and  Asiatics  to  compensate  for  her  sta- 
tionary population.  Most  important  of  all,  colonial  wars 
developed  a  new  generation  of  officers  and  kept  alive  the 
military  spirit.    Wealth,  too,  came  in  abundance. 

The  period  from  1900  to  1914  enters  intimately  into  the 
background  of  the  war,  and  its  phases  are  treated  in  sepa- 
rate chapters.  The  period  from  1871  to  1900  brought  the 
empire-building  instinct  of  the  French  into  play  in  five 
distinct  fields:  north  Africa;  west  and  central  Africa; 
Madagascar;  the  Far  East;  and  Oceania.  It  is  necessary 
to  comment  at  this  point  on  developments  in  these  quarters. 

Algeria  was  completely  conquered  during  the  reign  of 
Louis  Philippe,  and  in  1870  native  regiments  fought  with 
the  French  against  the  Germans.  After  that  date  the 
French  endeavored  to  make  Algeria  an  integral  part  of 
France.  European  settlers  and  Jews  were  granted  French 
citizenship ;  emigres  from  Alsace  and  Lorraine  were  given 
every  encouragement  to  settle  there;  and  the  government 
sought  to  turn  French  colonists  thither.  A  law  enacted  in 
1873  evicted  thousands  of  native  proprietors  from  their 
lands.  Then  followed  the  suppression  of  the  Moslem  sys- 
tem of  dispensing  justice  through  kadis  and  the  extension 
of  the  new  French  municipal  law.    This  put  the  govern- 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  55 

ment  of  communes  into  the  hands  of  minor  officials  and 
white  colonists,  who  became  legally  the  masters  of  the  des- 
tinies of  the  natives  among  whom  they  lived.  To  bring 
and  keep  colonists,  partial  exemption  from  militaiy  service 
and  taxation  was  offered,  and  likemse  the  lands  of  dis- 
possessed natives.  This  scheme  of  government  was  main- 
tained until  1898.  It  was  unpopular  vnth  the  natives,  and 
it  failed  to  attract  the  desired  colonists  from  France.  The 
reforms  that  have  brought  prosperity  and  contentment  to 
Algeria  were  not  put  into  effect,  and  administrative  control 
was  not  extended  to  the  Sahara  hinterland,  until  the  end 
of  the  nineteenth  century. 

The  conquest  of  Algeria  was  not  opposed  by  the  other 
powers.  But  when  France  expanded  eastward  into  Tunisia 
and  westward  into  Morocco  she  came  into  conflict  with 
Italy,  Spain,  Great  Britain,  and  Germany,  and  was  both 
the  beneficiary  and  the  victim  of  international  intrigues 
that  led  her  into  the  war  of  1914.  This  was  the  price  she 
paid  for  the  possession  of  what  Jules  Ferry  called  the  two 
keys  of  France's  house  in  Africa. 

When  the  French  conquered  A.lgeria  they  looked  upon 
the  occupation  of  Tunisia  as  a  logical  sequel.  But  after 
the  Crimean  War  Turkey  revived  her  claim  of  suzerainty. 
Napoleon  III  was  busy  mth  other  affairs,  and  the  British 
began  to  get  control.  They  loaned  money  to  the  bey  and 
built  the  first  railroads,  waterworks,  and  warehouses. 
Owing  to  the  proximity  of  Malta,  a  British  protectorate 
was  talked  about.  The  Italians,  however,  immediately 
after  their  unification,  decided  that  Tunisia  must  be  theirs. 
They  competed  with  the  British  and  in  1880  bought  the 
railroad  from  them.  From  1860  to  1880  tens  of  thousands 
of  Italian  colonists  went  to  the  coveted  land.  In  1878  at 
the  Congress  of  Berlin,  unknowTi  to  Italy,  Salisbury,  with 
the  consent  of  Bismarck,  assured  France  that  there  would 
be  no  opposition  to  intervention  by  her  in  Tunisia.  The 
French  invaded  the  country  from  Algeria  in  1881,  occupied 


56  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Tunisia,  and  forced  the  bey  to  sign  a  treaty  putting  himself 
under  French  protection.  After  two  years  of  fighting  the 
French  were  in  full  control.  Great  Britain,  followed  by 
the  other  powers,  accepted  the  fait  accompli  of  the  pro- 
tectorate. Only  the  Italians,  heartbroken  but  unable  to 
fight  the  French,  refused  to  recognize  the  occupation.  They 
thereupon  entered  the  Triple  Alliance  with  Germany  and 
their  traditional  enemy  Austria,  and  only  in  1896  was 
their  attitude  of  protest  abandoned.  On  the  ground  that 
the  regency  of  Tunisia  was  a  part  of  the  Ottoman  domin- 
ions, the  Porte  objected  to  the  French  invasion  and  to 
the  proclamation  of  the  protectorate.  Turkey  had  no 
power  to  back  her  remonstrances,  but  she  continued  to  make 
frontier  troubles  for  the  French  until  the  Italian  occupa- 
tion of  Tripoli  thirty  years  later.  Tunisia  has  prospered 
under  French  rule,  and  the  naval  base  at  Bizerta  has  given 
France  a  stronghold  in  the  Mediterranean  midway  between 
Marseilles  and  Beirut. 

During  the  conquest  of  Algeria  the  most  stubborn  enemy 
of  France,  Abd-el-Kader,  took  refuge  in  Moroccan  terri- 
tory. The  encouragement  thus  given  to  the  Algerians,  and 
the  desire  to  draw  their  own  western  boundary,  prompted 
the  French  to  send  an  army  against  the  sultan  of  Morocco, 
who  signed  the  treaty  of  Tangier  in  1845.  The  boundary 
line  was  defined,  and  the  sultan  promised  to  give  no  further 
hospitality  or  comfort  to  Algerian  rebels.  Spain  fought 
Morocco  in  1859  and  secured  recognition  of  definite  fron- 
tiers for  her  zone  by  the  treaty  of  Tetuan  in  1860.  Be- 
cause of  British  interference,  both  of  these  treaties  were 
less  drastic  than  French  and  Spaniards  intended  them  to  be. 

During  the  entire  period  under  survey  Great  Britain 
backed  the  sultan  of  Morocco  against  both  French  and 
Spaniards,  and  the  latter  did  all  they  could  against  the 
French.  Between  1471  and  1684  Tangier  had  belonged  to 
Portugal,  to  Spain,  to  Portugal  again,  and  finally  to  Eng- 
land.    Owing  to  the  mutual  unwillingness  of  the  powers 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  57 

to  see  one  another  ensconced  in  Morocco,  and  especially 
to  the  determination  of  Great  Britain,  after  the  British 
seized  Gibraltar,  to  brook  no  rival  in  the  Straits,  Morocco 
remained  a  No  Man's  Land  until  the  beginning  of  the  twen- 
tieth century.  In  1880  a  conference  of  the  powers  at 
Madrid  agreed  upon  the  policy  of  no  special  favors  for  any 
one  power  in  the  matter  of  foreign  proteges,  and  from  this 
time  forth  their  representatives  watched  one  another  with 
a  jealous  eye.  In  1900  France  and  Italy  signed  a  secret 
agreement  not  to  interfere  mth  each  other  in  efforts  to 
extend  exclusive  economic,  and  later  political,  control  over 
Tripoli  and  Morocco,  and  the  w^ay  was  opened  to  France 
in  1904  when  a  similar  agreement  concerning  Morocco  and 
Egypt  was  signed  by  France  and  Great  Britain.  The 
French  originally  planned  to  take  all  of  North  Africa,  but 
in  order  to  have  Morocco  they  had  to  buy  off  Italy  and 
Great  Britain. 

Senegal,  the  oldest  French  colony  in  west  Africa,  goes 
back  to  the  days  of  Eichelieu.  St.  Louis,  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Senegal  River,  was  settled  in  1637.  French  claims  on 
the  Ivory  Coast  date  from  Louis  Philippe,  but  were  not 
made  good  until  1883,  when  the  Germans  began  to  look  for 
colonies  in  west  Africa.  The  German  occupation  of  Togo 
and  Kamerun  stimulated  British  and  French  activity  in 
the  basins  of  the  Congo,  Niger,  and  Senegal.  The  geog- 
raphy of  these  vast  territories  was  little  kno^vn,  and  it 
was  natural  that  explorers  and  traders  and  soldiers  should 
cross  one  another's  trail  in  staking  out  the  claims  of  their 
respective  countries.  This  necessitated  conferences  and 
bargaining  among  statesmen  who  knew  imperfectly,  if  at 
all,  the  countries  they  were  giving  one  another. 

The  ambition  of  France  in  west  and  central  Africa  was 
to  build  up  an  empire  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Nile  and 
from  the  Mediterranean  to  the  Congo.  When  the  work  of 
explorers  and  missionaries  resulted  in  the  dramng  of  ac- 
curate maps  and  a  knowledge  of  the  tribes  inhabiting  the 


58  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

interior,  France,  already  mistress  of  Algeria,  of  Senegal, 
and  of  Gabun,  was  ready  for  the  penetration.  Dahomey 
was  conquered  in  1893.  From  1881  to  1894,  when  Tim- 
buktu was  captured,  the  French,  by  a  succession  of  military 
expeditions,  brought  under  their  flag  all  the  vast  country 
from  the  Senegal  to  the  upper  Niger.  During  the  next 
four  years  they  went  from  Timbuktu  through  Lake  Chad, 
and  from  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  through  the  upper  Congo  to 
the  head-waters  of  the  Nile. 

Agreements  were  signed  with  Portugal  in  1886,  with 
Great  Britain  in  1889,  1890,  1892,  1893,  1895,  and  1898,  and 
with  Germany  in  1897.  The  Anglo-French  declaration  of 
1890  was  a  compromise  in  which  Great  Britain  recognized 
French  influence  over  the  whole  central  Sahara  and  a 
French  protectorate  over  Madagascar  in  return  for  French 
recognition  of  British  supremacy  in  Zanzibar.  Expedi- 
tions from  Timbuktu  and  Dahomey  converged  some  dis- 
tance east  of  Lake  Chad.  When  Major  Marchand  planted 
the  French  flag  at  Fashoda  on  the  Nile,  in  1898,  French  and 
British  finally  came  to  the  verge  of  war. 

Portuguese  and  Dutch  were  the  first  settlers  on  Mada- 
gascar, and  the  English  tried  to  establish  a  tea  plantation 
there  in  1630.  From  Louis  XIV  to  Louis  XVI  the  French 
had  military  posts  on  the  island  and  were  continually  fight- 
ing the  natives  with  little  success.  The  treaty  of  Paris  in 
1814  turned  the  French  settlements  over  to  the  British. 
But  in  point  of  fact  the  last  of  them  had  been  given  up 
several  years  earlier.  The  British,  moreover,  took  the 
He  de  France,  in  the  Indian  Ocean,  from  France  in  1810, 
gave  it  its  old  Dutch  name,  Mauritius,  and  have  held  it  ever 
since.  From  Mauritius  they  endeavored  to  secure  in  Mada- 
gascar the  influence  the  French  formerly  enjoyed.  They 
sent  missionaries,  whose  teachings  were  accepted  readily  by 
the  Malagasy.  As  in  Japan  two  hundred  years  earlier, 
and  for  the  same  reason  (suspicion  of  the  motives  of  the 
missionaries),  Christianity  was  vigorously  suppressed.    In 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  59 

1861,  after  twenty-five  years  of  non-intercourse,  a  change 
of  sovereign  led  to  the  reopening  of  the  island  to  European 
trade  and  missionary  effort.  The  Malagasy  refused  to 
give  the  French  exclusive  rights,  and  made  treaties  with 
Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  as  well  as  with  France. 
The  French  persisted  in  their  claims,  and  in  1883  bom- 
barded Tamatave  and  landed  troops.  After  two  years  of 
fighting,  the  Malagasy  queen  signed  a  treaty  agreeing  to 
a  protectorate,  in  substance  if  not  in  name.  But  British 
opposition,  which  went  to  the  extent  of  aiding  the  Malagasy 
government  in  training  an  army,  made  ineffective  the  priv- 
ileges the  French  hoped  to  gain.  In  1890  the  French  and 
British  governments  mutually  agreed  to  give  each  other 
a  free  hand  in  Zanzibar  and  in  Madagascar.  In  1895 
the  French  invaded  and  conquered  the  central  provinces 
of  Madagascar,  allowing  the  queen,  however,  to  con- 
tinue to  occupy  the  throne  under  French  protection. 
But  a  rebellion  in  the  next  year  resulted  in  the  total  aboli- 
tion of  the  island 's  independence.  The  queen  was  exiled  to 
Algeria,  and  Madagascar  was  proclaimed  a  colony  of 
France.  It  took  four  years  more  to  establish  complete 
authority. 

In  the  southeastern  corner  of  Asia,  Anam,  Cambodia, 
Tongking,  and  Cochin-China  were,  up  to  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  independent  states,  with  a  long  history 
behind  them  of  fighting  one  another  and  of  wars  with  Siam 
and  China.  The  Cambodians  and  Anamese  had  succes- 
sively been  masters  of  the  whole  country,  and  had  been 
under  the  suzerainty  of  China  and  Siam.  They  had  also 
received  and  expelled  the  Portuguese  and  Dutch.  So  in- 
volved with  claims  and  counter-claims  is  the  history  of  the 
Indo-Chinese  states  that,  as  in  the  Balkan  portions  of 
Europe,  each  race  could  go  back  to  a  period  of  supremacy 
to  establish  a  title ;  while  the  Siamese  and  Chinese,  power- 
ful neighbors,  were  able  to  claim  frontiers  and  overlord- 
ehip.    Through  French  missionaries  France  was  called  in 


60  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

to  intervene  in  one  of  the  wars,  and  in  the  treaty  of  Ver- 
sailles, in  1787,  the  ruler  of  Cochin-China  ceded  the  island 
of  Pulo-Condore  to  France,  and  promised  to  assist  that 
nation  in  wars  against  other  powers,  in  return  for  French 
assistance  in  restoring  and  maintaining  him  on  the  throne 
of  his  country. 

The  successors  of  the  king  who  made  this  treaty  repudi- 
ated it  and  persecuted  Christian  missionaries  and  converts. 
This  gave  the  French  an  excuse  for  intervening,  in  coopera- 
tion with  the  Spaniards,  during  the  early  years  of  the  reign 
of  Napoleon  III.  Until  the  Far  East  became  commercially 
attractive  to  the  French,  and  they  saw  the  British  deriving 
advantages  from  the  possession  of  Hong-Kong,  the  anti- 
Christian  attitude  of  the  Cochin-Chinese  did  not  trouble 
Paris.  The  treaty  of  Versailles  slept  in  the  archives.  In 
1858,  when  the  French  combined  with  the  British  against 
China,  a  Franco-Spanish  fleet  captured  the  port  of  Tourane. 
The  French  seized  Saigon.  Opposed  by  the  Anamese,  war 
followed  with  their  country;  and  in  1862  Anam  concluded 
a  treaty  with  France  and  Spain  recognizing  the  cession  of 
three  provinces  of  Cochin-China  to  France,  promised  secur- 
ity to  French  and  Spanish  missionaries,  and  agreed  to  pay 
an  indemnity  to  the  two  powers. 

In  1863  Cambodia  accepted  the  protectorate  of  France, 
and  in  1867  the  other  three  provinces  of  Cochin-China,  left 
to  Anam  by  the  treaty  of  1862,  were  annexed.  In  the  same 
year  Siam  and  France  signed  a  treaty  at  Paris  by  which 
the  Siamese  recognized  the  French  protectorate  of  Cam- 
bodia in  return  for  the  two  provinces  nearest  Siam. 

The  Third  Republic  tirelessly  extended  the  footholds  in 
southeastern  Asia  secured  by  the  Second  Empire.  In  1880 
China,  to  whom  the  Anamese  had  appealed,  notified  France 
that  Tongking  and  Anam  were  states  tributary  to  Peking. 
The  answer  of  France  was  a  military  expedition  to  Anam, 
which  was  forced  to  accept  the  French  protectorate  in  1883. 
Against  the  protests  of  the  Chinese  minister  in  Paris,  the 


THE  SPOLIATION  OP  AN  ASIATIC  STATE 

SIAM  BETOOE   1893   AND  AITEK   1910 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  61 

French  advanced  into  Tongking  and  made  the  king  of  Anam 
sign  a  second  treaty  recognizing  a  French  protectorate 
over  Tongking.  This  led  to  war  with  China.  By  the 
treaty  of  Tientsin  (1885)  and  two  supplementary  agree- 
ments (1887),  France  exacted  from  China  recognition  of 
the  Anamese  treaties,  including  her  possession  of  Tong- 
king, a  delimitation  of  frontier  between  China  and  Tong- 
king, and  profitable  terms  of  commercial  intercourse  be- 
tween China  and  the  French  protectorates.  But  the  French 
found  eight  years  of  warfare  necessary  to  subdue  their 
new  proteges. 

Through  the  annexation  of  Carabodia,  France  became  a 
neighbor  of  Siam.  We  can  not  go  into  the  story  of  the  long 
dispute  between  France  and  Siam  over  the  boundary  of 
Indo-China.  It  was  an  unequal  contest.  France  did  not 
abide  by  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  1867;  for,  since  her 
administrative  control  of  Indo-China  was  developed,  she 
was  determined  to  get  possession  of  the  Mekong  Valley 
and  Laos.  Occasions  for  intervention  were  manufactured, 
and  force  was  used.  In  1893  gunboats  appeared  before 
Bangkok  and  threatened  to  bombard  the  city  if  the  Siamese 
did  not  evacuate  the  left  bank  of  the  Mekong  and  the 
islands  in  the  river,  cede  Laos  to  France,  and  maintain  a 
neutral  zone  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Mekong  and  the  new 
Indo-Chinese  frontier.  Siam  had  to  agree.  Great  Britain 
intervened,  not,  as  it  proved  later,  to  protect  Siam,  but  to 
check  the  French  advance  to  the  frontier  of  Burma  and 
to  get  something  from  Siam  for  herself.  The  Siamese 
frontier  questions  were  still  unsettled  with  Great  Britain 
when  the  French  secured  the  rounding  out  of  their  Indo- 
Chinese  empire  on  the  northwest  by  the  Peking  convention 
of  1895.  The  British  Foreign  Office  protested  to  China 
that  cession  of  territory  to  France  in  this  region  violated 
an  agreement  made  the  j^ear  before  mth  Great  Britain  to 
the  effect  that  no  portion  of  the  country  ceded  to  France 
should  be  alienated  to  any  other  power  "without  previous 


62  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

agreement  with  Great  Britain."  The  British  gave  in  for 
a  quid  pro  quo,  that  is,  by  getting  something  from  China 
themselves.  The  Franco-British  declaration  of  1896  agreed 
on  a  bomidary  between  the  '* spheres  of  influence"  of  the 
two  powers  as  far  as  the  Chinese  frontier.  But  the  French 
did  not  have  a  free  hand  with  Siam  until  the  Franco-British 
agreement  of  1904.  Unopposed  by  any  other  power, 
France  took  more  territory  from  Siam  both  in  1904  and 
in  1907. 

In  Oceania  the  Spaniards  and  Dutch  were  the  only  navi- 
gators to  report  discoveries  before  the  second  half  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  Between  1767,  when  the  Society  and 
Low  Islands  were  discovered,  and  1803,  when  the  Loyalty 
Islands  were  reported  by  the  British,  who  had  just  landed 
in  Tasmania,  the  mapping  of  the  south  Pacific  was  largely 
done  by  the  British,  many  of  whose  claims  date  from  the 
voyages  of  Captain  Cook.  The  first  French  expedition  of 
importance  was  that  of  Dumont  d'Urville,  who  surveyed 
the  Loyalty  Islands  in  1827.  Three  years  later  Roman 
Catholic  missionaries  went  from  France  to  New  Caledonia, 
whence  they  spread  to  Tahiti,  the  Marquesas,  and  other 
archipelagos.  Everywhere  British  Protestant  mission- 
aries and  French  Catholic  missionaries  were  at  logger- 
heads. But  the  French  government  realized  before  the 
British  government  the  possibilities  of  this  remote  part  of 
the  world.  In  1842  a  French  crew  secured  the  recognition 
of  a  French  protectorate  over  Tahiti  and  the  other  Wind- 
ward Islands  of  the  Society  group  and  the  Marquesas. 
The  expulsion  of  the  British  consul  from  Tahiti  by  the 
French  led  to  difficulties  with  the  British  government,  and 
to  opposition  by  the  British  to  the  extension  of  the  French 
protectorate  to  the  Leeward  group. 

But  in  1853  the  French  got  ahead  of  the  British  in  New 
Caledonia  and  annexed  the  island  and  its  neighbor,  the 
Isle  of  Pines.  The  London  government,  at  that  moment 
anghng  for  an  alliance  with  Napoleon  III  in  a  war  against 


FKENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1830-1900)  63 

Russia,  did  not  protest.  The  Loyalty  Islands,  despite  vio- 
lent opposition  on  the  part  of  British  missionaries,  were 
added  to  the  French  possessions  in  1864.  Following  the 
example  of  the  British  in  AustraUa,  the  French  used  New 
Caledonia  for  a  penal  station  for  political  offenders  and 
ordinary  criminals.  It  was  New  Caledonia  that  received 
the  exiles  from  the  Paris  commune.  But  the  transporta- 
tion of  criminals  was  discontinued  in  1898,  and  since  then 
the  white  element  of  the  population  has  decreased.  In 
fact,  France  has  done  so  little  with  New  Caledonia  that  the 
Australians  have  looked  on  with  envious  eyes. 

The  native  ruUng  family  of  Tahiti  was  dispossessed  in 
1880,  and  the  island  became  a  French  colony.  In  1887  the 
British  agreed  to  abandon  their  insistence  upon  the  neu- 
trality of  the  Leeward  group,  which  enabled  the  French  to 
extend  their  protection  over  the  entire  Society  Islands. 
This  arrangement  also  gave  the  French  control  of  Raiatea 
in  the  New  Hebrides  group.  The  New  Hebrides  were  de- 
clared neutral  by  Great  Britain  and  France  in  1878,  after 
missionaries  of  both  countries  had  been  urging  annexation 
upon  London  and  Paris.  Lord  Salisbury,  desiring  to  have 
the  good-will  of  France  at  the  Congress  of  Berlin,  refused 
to  go  farther  than  a  policy  of  mutual  abstention.  But  a 
convention  of  1887  established  a  condominium  which  was 
confirmed  by  the  Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904.  Omng 
to  their  position  on  the  route  to  North  America  and  Asia, 
the  New  Hebrides,  however,  became  a  source  of  friction. 
New  Zealand  and  Australia,  especially  the  latter,  protested 
violently  at  London  against  the  agreements  of  1878,  1887, 
and  1904. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  France,  like 
Great  Britain,  was  in  an  advantageous  position  to  main- 
tain and  extend  her  world  power.  In  fact,  the  two  nations 
were  in  a  class  by  themselves  as  regards  the  size,  the  dis- 
tribution, and  the  potentialities  for  naval  and  military 
power,  for  trade  and  investment  development,  of  their  over- 


64  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

seas  possessions.  Russia,  the  only  other  great  colonial 
power,  came  nowhere  into  rivalry  with  France.  But 
France  and  Great  Britain  had  conflicting  aims  throughout 
the  world.  Great  Britain's  control  of  the  seas  made  com- 
promises advisable  at  Paris.  The  alternative  of  war  would 
have  meant  a  loss  of  everything  except  Algeria,  and  per- 
haps even  of  that.  The  Third  Republic  extended  France 
to  the  southern  Pacific,  Madagascar,  and  southeastern 
Asia,  but  in  so  doing  made  her  dependent  upon  the  mistress 
of  the  seas.  The  Entente  Cordiale  grew  out  of  the  colonial 
development  of  France  in  the  first  thirty  years  of  the  Third 
Republic. 


CHAPTER  V 

BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878) 

OF  the  leading  powers  at  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  Great 
Britain  alone  attached  importance  to  questions  out- 
side of  Europe.  The  Holy  Alliance  of  Eussia,  Prussia,  and 
Austria  did  not  appeal  to  her.  Since  Cromwell  inaugurated 
the  aggressive  foreign  policy  of  England,  changes  in  the 
governments  and  boundaries  of  European  states  have 
alarmed  British  statesmen  to  the  point  of  war  or  threats 
of  war  only  when  the  upsetting  of  the  balance  of  power  to 
the  benefit  of  one  country  made  the  aspirant  to  domination 
in  Europe  a  challenger  of  England's  sea  power  and  a  rival 
of  England's  trade.  When  the  object  of  intervention  was 
attained,  the  British  withdrew  from  active  participation  in 
continental  affairs  and  let  allies  and  enemies  work  out  their 
own  salvation  in  post-bellum  reconstruction.  The  prece- 
dent and  traditions  of  earlier  interventions  were  followed 
after  Vienna. 

During  the  momentous  years  from  1789  to  1815  Great 
Britain  won  by  conquest  Ceylon,  Trinidad,  Malta,  a  part 
of  Guiana,  St.  Lucia,  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  Seychelles, 
Mauritius,  Ascension,  and  Tristan  da  Cunha.  The  first 
settlement  in  AustraUa  was  made  at  New  South  Wales  in 
the  year  before  the  French  Revolution,  and  Tasmania  was 
settled  in  1803.  As  we  have  already  seen,  the  conquest  of 
India  was  pressed  vigorously  from  1801  to  1817.  In  1815 
Nepal,  although  retaining  its  independence,  was  brought 
under  British  influence. 

From  1815  to  1878  the  growth  of  the  British  Empire  was 
rapid.  Except  in  India  and  China,  it  was  not  a  period  of 
conquest.    Wars  were  fought  only  to  protect  claims  al- 

65 


66  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ready  staked  out  and  in  the  process  of  development  and  to 
prevent  other  powers  from  menacing  the  British  imperial 
trade  routes  by  land  or  sea.  Military  prowess  played  its 
part,  but  the  ''native  wars"  had  no  effect  upon  the  rela- 
tions of  the  British  with  the  continental  powers.  In  Europe 
Great  Britain's  interests  led  her  to  play  a  negative  role 
in  international  diplomacy  from  the  Congress  of  Vienna 
to  the  Congress  of  Berlin.  Among  themselves  the  powers 
could  do  as  they  pleased.  The  veto  of  Great  Britain  was 
heard  in  international  councils  only  when  questions  of 
overseas  policy  arose.  For  example,  British  statesman- 
ship opposed  the  scheme  of  the  Holy  Alliance  to  help  Spain 
win  back  her  American  colonies  in  1822-23;  Russia's  inten- 
tion, without  consulting  the  other  powers,  to  aid  the  Greeks 
in  1825  and  the  Turks  in  1833 ;  France 's  encouragement  of 
Mehemet  Ali  in  1839-40;  Russia's  second  attempt  to  eman- 
cipate Ottoman  Christians,  in  1853-55;  and  Russia's  third 
attempt  to  emancipate  Ottoman  Christians,  in  1877-78. 
With  Russia  and  France — the  only  other  powers  that 
showed  marked  colonial  activity — Great  Britain  came  into 
occasional  diplomatic  conflict ;  and  from  Denmark  and  Hol- 
land titles  were  acquired  on  the  west  African  coast. 

The  development  of  the  British  Empire  in  the  two  de- 
cades of  the  Napoleonic  wars  was  due  only  in  part  to  the 
factors  mentioned  before — geographical  position,  a  lucky 
start  all  over  the  world,  and  the  advance  by  a  hundred 
years,  in  political  unification,  over  rivals.  There  are  other 
causes,  material  and  moral,  for  the  unique  place  in  the 
world  of  the  British  Empire.  The  British  had  coal  at  tide- 
water. Their  brains  and  energy  were  responsible  for  the 
adaptation  of  steam  power  to  industry  and  transportation. 
They  were  master  mariners.  They  won  fairly  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  sea.  But,  most  important  of  all,  they  were 
willing  to  expatriate  themselves,  not  only  to  fight  and  die 
for  their  country,  but  to  settle  and  develop  the  overseas 
territories  to  which  they  took  title.    The  study  of  world 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  67 

politics  leads  us  to  put  emphasis  upon  the  obvious  and  least 
admirable  factors  in  colonial  expansion.  We  deal  with  in- 
ternational relations,  which  means  the  study  of  diplomacy, 
of  chicanery,  of  hypocrisy,  of  violence.  Because  we  have 
as  yet  learned  no  other  way,  might  invariably  goes  before 
right  in  international  affairs.  Among  nations,  the  influ- 
ence of  a  country  is  in  proportion  to  its  strength,  and  in 
intercourse  with  non-European  races  the  British  have  been 
the  most  successful  in  the  methods  that  all  modem  powers 
have  used  when  they  had  the  chance.  But,  as  we  shall 
see,  the  British  continued  to  hold  their  OAvn,  and  to  extend 
their  empire,  after  the  other  nations  of  Europe  entered  the 
colonial  field.  In  the  supreme  test  of  the  World  War  their 
titles  were  nowhere  surrendered  or  transferred.  Suprem- 
acy of  the  seas  and  military  strength  alone  could  not  have 
accomplished  this.  From  the  beginning  of  her  colonial  ex- 
pansion, England  sent  abroad  colonists  and  administrators 
who  were  willing  to  cast  in  their  fortunes  mth  the  new 
territories  to  which  they  went. 

In  the  period  under  survey  there  evolved  in  the  British 
Empire  four  distinct  types  of  possessions:  (1)  territories 
situated  in  the  temperate  zone,  where  settlers  from  Europe 
were  able  to  found  new  nations  of  Aryan  stock;  (2)  terri- 
tories where  Europeans  already  lived  or  to  which  English- 
men and  Scotchmen  emigrated  in  sufficient  numbers  to  be- 
come the  controlling  element  politically  and  economically; 
(3)  protectorates  and  dependencies;  and  (4)  isolated  foot- 
holds, ports  or  islands,  valuable  only  as  coaling  stations  on 
trade  routes.  In  the  first  category  we  have  in  the  overseas 
expansion  of  Europe  a  renewal  of  movements  of  popula- 
tion such  as  had  not  taken  place  in  the  world  since  our 
ancestors  came  to  Europe  from  Asia;  in  the  second,  a 
speedily  checked  effort  at  extensive  colonization,  but  no 
abandonment  of  existing  settlement,  because  opportunities 
arose  of  production  for  export  to  Europe;  in  the  third,  a 
form  of  extension   of  European   eminent  domain  which 


68  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

would  never  have  become  profitable  save  for  the  new  con- 
ditions in  industry  and  transportation  of  the  nineteenth 
century;  and  in  the  fourth,  a  means  of  protecting  and 
facilitating  communications  with  colonies. 

Queen  Elizabeth's  first  patent  to  Sir  Walter  Raleigh 
permitted  British  subjects  to  accompany  him  to  America, 
"with  guaranty  of  a  continuance  of  the  enjoyment  of  all 
the  rights  which  her  subjects  enjoyed  at  home."  Although 
this  may  have  meant  only  the  assurance  of  non-forfeiture 
of  citizenship  through  residence  abroad,  it  was  interpreted 
by  Anglo-Saxon  settlers  during  the  seventeenth  and  eight- 
eenth centuries  to  mean  the  right  to  carry  mth  them 
wherever  they  went  the  privilege  of  self-government. 
Great  Britain  learned  a  lesson  in  the  loss  of  the  American 
colonies  by  the  treaty  of  Paris  in  1783.  When  the  process 
of  demanding  responsible  government  began  to  repeat  it- 
self in  Canada,  Australia,  New  Zealand,  and  South  Africa, 
the  colonies  were  allowed  to  federate  and  form  self-gov- 
erning dominions.  New  political  units  thus  arose,  bound 
to  the  mother  country  by  ties  of  their  own  volition.  The 
white  man's  countries  of  the  British  Empire,  in  turn,  on 
the  ground  of  prosperity  as  well  as  security,  became  inter- 
ested in  colonial  expansion  in  their  own  parts  of  the  world, 
and  in  the  importance  of  the  control  of  the  trade  routes 
leading  from  them  to  the  mother  countiy. 

The  War  of  1812  proved  the  attachment  of  Canada  to 
Great  Britain.  North  of  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  St.  Law- 
rence, the  English-speaking  colonies  had  no  desire  to  join 
the  United  States.  The  boundary  between  New  Brunswick 
and  Maine,  which  led  to  frontier  disturbances  in  1839,  was 
settled  by  the  Webster-Ashburton  treaty  in  1842,  while 
the  Oregon  treaty  fixed  the  boundary  with  British  Colum- 
bia in  1846.  Serious  and  sustained  friction  between  the 
United  States  and  Great  Britain  over  Canada  has  never 
arisen.    Fishing  and  boundary  disputes  have  always  been 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  69 

adjusted  by  arbitration,  and  the  overwhelming  inferiority 
of  the  Canadians  in  numbers,  coupled  with  the  good-will 
between  the  two  peoples,  has  made  unnecessary  the  mili- 
taiy  and  naval  guarding  of  the  frontier.  Trade  questions 
have  been  decided  directly  between  the  United  States  and 
Canada,  even  when  negotiations  were  carried  on  through 
London.  After  a  rebellion,  in  1840,  responsible  govern- 
ment was  granted  to  the  Canadian  colonies,  and  in  1867 
Ontario,  Quebec,  New  Brunswick,  and  Nova  Scotia  were 
confederated  as  the  Dominion  of  Canada.  In  the  same 
year  the  United  States,  by  purchasing  Russian  America 
and  forming  it  into  the  territory  of  Alaska,  got  ahead  of 
the  British  on  the  Pacific  coast.  The  Hudson's  Bay  Com- 
pany territory  was  ceded  to  Canada  in  1870,  and  from  the 
lower  part  of  it  Manitoba  was  formed.  British  Columbia 
joined  the  Dominion  in  1871,  stipulating  that  a  railway 
should  be  built  at  government  expense  to  the  Pacific  coast 
within  ten  years.  Prince  Edward  Island  entered  in  1873. 
Newfoundland,  the  oldest  British  colony,  with  her  depend- 
ency Labrador,  has  remained  outside. 

South  Africa  passed  through  a  century  of  varying  for- 
tunes under  British  rule  before  a  union  of  colonies  could 
be  formed  and  given  self-government.  In  Canada  the 
French  remained  chiefly  in  the  province  of  Quebec,  and 
were  soon  outnumbered  elsewhere  by  the  English-speaking 
elements.  In  south  Africa  the  Dutch  colonists,  called 
Boers,  were  mostly  irreconcilable,  and  when  British  set- 
tlers came  in  considerable  numbers  these  Boers  began  to 
trek  into  the  interior.  In  the  great  trek  of  1836  to  1840 
they  passed  over  the  Orange  and  Vaal  rivers.  They  also 
went  up  the  east  coast  and  wrested  part  of  Natal  from  the 
Zulus.  As  Natal  lay  along  the  coast,  the  British  refused 
to  admit  the  possibility  of  an  independent  Boer  state  in 
that  quarter.  In  1843  Natal  was  proclaimed  British  terri- 
tory and  erected  into  a  colony.    In  the  interior,  however, 


70  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  Boers  were  able  to  create  two  republics,  the  Orange 
Free  State  in  1854  and  the  Transvaal  Republic  in  1858. 
Expansion  northward  from  the  Cape,  strengthened  by  im- 
migration, took  the  British  into  the  interior  and  along  both 
the  Indian  and  Atlantic  coasts.  Boers  and  British  alike 
had  troubles  with  the  natives.  A  Kaffir  war  in  1851,  in 
which  the  Hottentots  joined,  took  two  years  to  crush.  In 
1865  part  of  Kaffraria  became  British;  two  years  later 
twelve  islands  off  Angra  Pequena  were  annexed;  and  in 
1871  Basutoland  and  the  southeastern  part  of  Bechuana- 
land  were  added  to  the  Cape  territory.  In  1878  Walfisch 
Bay,  the  best  harbor  in  southwest  Africa,  together  with  a 
few  miles  of  the  coast,  was  annexed.  Believing  that  the 
Transvaal  Boers,  after  an  exhausting  war  with  the  Zulus 
(in  which  the  British  themselves  were  engaged),  were  too 
weak  to  maintain  their  independence,  Disraeli  ordered  the 
annexation  of  the  Transvaal  in  1877.  But  the  Boers 
showed  surprising  strength  and  the  British  gave  up  the 
project  for  the  time  being.  In  America,  English  and 
French  and  Spanish  had  armed  natives  against  white  men 
in  colonial  wars.  The  overwhelming  disproportion  of 
numbers  made  the  use  of  blacks  too  dangerous  in  the  strug- 
gles between  Boers  and  Britons. 

The  British  title  to  Canada  and  South  Africa  is  based 
upon  conquest  from  other  European  peoples  that  had  made 
prior  settlement  and  whose  colonists  had  to  become  British 
subjects.  In  both  dominions  the  descendants  of  the  origi- 
nal colonists  retained  their  mother  tongue,  and,  although 
accorded  the  privileges  of  English  institutions,  the  most 
precious  of  which  is  self-government,  French  and  Dutch 
did  not  become  assimilated.  Through  their  ecclesiastical 
organizations  they  maintained  their  schools,  and  thus  kept 
alive  their  culture.  In  neither  case,  however,  was  their 
lack  of  assimilation  due  to  an  effort  on  the  part  of  the 
country  of  their  origin.  In  the  nineteenth  century,  in  so 
far  as  France  and  Holland  were  concerned,  the  French 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  71 

Canadian  and  Boer  questions  did  not  enter  into  interna- 
tional politics. 

Australia  and  New  Zealand  are  British  by  right  of  dis- 
covery and  settlement.  The  British  went  to  New  South 
Wales  in  1788 ;  began  to  colonize  Tasmania,  the  island  south 
of  Australia,  in  1803 ;  established  missions  in  New  Zealand 
in  1814;  colonized  west  Australia  in  1829  and  south  Aus- 
tralia in  1836 ;  and  began  to  settle  in  New  Zealand  in  1840. 
The  climate  of  New  Zealand  is  favorable  to  European  colo- 
nization. The  great  obstacle  was  the  hostility  of  the 
Maoris,  whose  treatment  of  shipwrecked  sailors  in  the 
early  days  made  them  a  terror  to  the  white  man.  Mission- 
ary work  was  remarkably  successful,  and  it  led  to  the  tam- 
ing of  the  natives  to  the  point  where  colonization  was  not 
opposed  by  arms.  On  the  contrary,  a  group  of  native  chief- 
tains gave  the  islands  to  the  queen  of  England  in  1840.  A 
Maori  war  broke  out  in  1864,  and  it  took  five  years  to 
restore  peace. 

The  development  of  colonization  in  Australia  did  not 
carry  the  British  far  into  the  interior  of  the  continent. 
Except  in  certain  places  along  the  coast,  only  the  south- 
eastern corner  of  the  country  is  sufficiently  cool  and  fertile 
for  European  settlement.  But  where  white  men  could  live 
the  natives  made  virtually  no  opposition,  and  the  process 
of  colonization  was  rapid.  Melbourne  was  founded  in  1835. 
Victoria  and  Queensland  were  separated  from  New  South 
Wales  in  1851  and  1859.  The  discovery  of  gold  in  1851 
aided  decidedly  in  attracting  colonists,  and  both  Australia 
and  New  Zealand  were  brought  nearer  to  London  by  the 
opening  of  the  Suez  Canal  in  1869  and  the  laying  of  a 
cable  in  1872.  Responsible  government  was  granted  to 
New  Zealand  in  1852,  and  to  the  Australian  colonies  begin- 
ning in  1855.  No  other  power  has  ever  tried  to  gain  a 
foothold  on  the  Australian  continent  or  in  New  Zealand. 
Small  groups  of  islands  around  the  colonies  were  annexed 
from  time  to  time,  with  the  aid  of  the  home  government. 


72  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

But  in  no  case  during  the  period  under  survey  did  Aus- 
tralia or  New  Zealand  cause  friction  among  the  great 
powers. 

Most  of  the  possessions  of  the  second  category  belonged 
to  the  British  through  conquest  or  settlement  before  the 
French  Revolution,  or  became  definitely  British  through 
the  conventions  and  treaties  of  1814  and  1815,  and  already 
contained  a  European  element  in  their  population,  which 
was  thus  in  each  instance  compelled  to  transfer  its  alle- 
giance. At  the  time  of  the  founding  of  the  colonies  that 
later  became  the  United  States,  the  British  also  settled 
Barbados,  the  Bermudas,  the  Bahamas,  and  most  of  the 
Leeward  Islands.  To  their  West  Indian  possessions  the 
other  Leeward  Islands,  the  Windward  Islands,  Tobago,  and 
Trinidad  were  added  by  conquest  during  the  wars  with 
France  and  Spain  in  the  second  half  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury. Prince  Edward  Island,  Nova  Scotia,  New  Bruns- 
wick, St.  Christopher,  and  Nevis,  originally  colonized  by 
the  British,  were  given  to  France  in  1632  and  won  back  by 
the  treaty  of  Utrecht  in  1713.  Jamaica,  one  of  the  most 
notable  colonies  of  the  second  category  mentioned  above, 
was  conquered  from  Spain  in  1655.  From  the  treaty  of 
Vienna  to  the  treaty  of  Berlin,  Great  Britain  came  into 
conflict  with  no  other  power,  and  laid  the  foundation  of 
no  future  quarrel,  by  reason  of  her  cro^vn  colonies,  in  which 
British  planters  and  traders  did  not  rely  upon  diplomatic 
intervention  for  their  prosperity  or  security.  The  posses- 
sion of  the  island  colonies  of  this  type  was  not  a  factor  of 
moment  in  international  relations. 

The  colonial  acquisitions  and  the  development  of  titles, 
which  brought  Great  Britain  into  antagonism  with  other 
world  powers,  belong  to  the  third  and  fourth  categories 
and  fall  within  the  world  politics  period  of  history.  It  is 
not  always  possible  to  distinguish  between  possessions  of 
the  third  and  fourth  categories.  Gibraltar,  key  to  the 
Mediterranean,  and  Malta,  which  enables  Great  Britain  to 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  73 

play  a  decisive  role  in  Near  Eastern  events,  were  demanded 
as  rewards  in  the  treaty  of  Utrecht,  1713,  and  the  treaty  of 
Paris,  1814,  for  strategic  reasons.  Other  bases,  like  Hong- 
Kong,  which  gives  Great  Britain  a  privileged  position  in 
the  Far  East,  belong  to  the  third  as  well  as  the  fourth 
category. 

In  tracing  the  expansion  of  the  British  Empire  from  1815 
to  1878,  after  we  have  considered  the  groups  of  colonies  in 
temperate  climates  that  federated  and  became  self-govern- 
ing dominions,  British  colonial  activity  must  be  treated 
from  the  dual  point  of  view  of  creating  and  stimulating 
overseas  markets  and  the  carrying  trade  and  of  protecting 
the  markets  and  the  merchant  marine.  For  themselves 
first,  and  then  for  the  colonies  peopled  by  the  overflow  of 
population  from  England  and  Scotland,  the  British  sought 
security  and  prosperity.  In  buttressing  the  British  Em- 
pire and  gaining  control  of  trade  routes  to  all  parts  of  the 
world,  they  took  what  they  wanted,  or  thought  they  needed, 
in  Asia  and  Africa,  and  opposed  by  diplomatic  pres- 
sure and  by  force  the  expansion  of  every  other  European 
power  where  they  felt  that  this  expansion  would  jeopard- 
ize their  plans  for  strengthening  and  adding  to  the  empire. 
The  dominant  considerations  were  India  and  the  trade 
routes  from  England  to  India,  from  England  to  the  other 
colonies,  and  from  the  other  colonies  to  India.  If  we  bear 
these  facts  in  mind,  Ave  shall  be  able  to  discern  the  motives 
and  course  of  empire-building  and  of  British  participation 
in  international  affairs. 

Bombay  was  ceded  by  Portugal  in  1661,  and  Madras, 
which  the  French  held  for  a  brief  period  in  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  became  definitely  British  in  1748. 
Bengal  was  built  up  by  bits  mitil  virtual  sovereignty  was 
established  by  the  conquest  of  Olive  in  1765.  We  have 
already  spoken  of  the  energy  and  successes  of  the  British 
in  India  during  the  Napoleonic  era.  The  conquest  of  the 
central  provinces  was  completed  in  1817.    Between  1825 


74      :     AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  1852  Assam,  Punjab,  and  Burma  were  added  to  British 
India.  The  Great  Mogul  surrendered  the  sovereignty  of 
DeUii  in  1832.  The  conquest  of  Ajmir-Merwara  was  com- 
pleted in  1818;  of  Coorg  in  1834;  and  of  Oudh  in  1856. 

In  1857  the  mutiny  of  the  Sepoys  at  Meerut  and  the  ris- 
ing of  the  Mohammedans  at  Delhi  caused  a  radical  change 
in  the  relations  between  Great  Britain  and  India.  Since 
the  days  of  Queen  Elizabeth  the  expansion  of  Great  Britain 
in  India  had  been  a  commercial  enterprise  under  the  con- 
trol of  a  chartered  corporation  known  as  the  East  India 
Company.  The  fiction  of  the  Mogul  Empire  had  been 
preserved.  After  the  siege  and  capture  of  Delhi,  in  the 
summer  of  1857,  it  was  necessary  to  depose  and  banish  the 
Great  Mogul.  The  establishment  of  another  sovereignty 
was  imperative.  Then,  too,  the  maintenance  and  expan- 
sion of  British  influence  in  India  demanded  sacrifices  and 
the  assumption  of  responsibilities  beyond  the  ability  of  the 
East  India  Company.  The  Afghan  War,  the  Second  Bur- 
mese War,  the  Crimean  War,  and  the  Sepoy  Rebellion 
proved  that.  The  possession  of  India  was  beginning  to 
involve  the  British  in  international  complications  with 
which  the  government  alone  was  in  a  position  to  cope.  In 
1858,  therefore,  the  government  of  India  was  transferred 
to  the  British  crown  and  a  viceroy  was  appointed.  After 
twenty  years,  the  queen  of  England  was  proclaimed  Em- 
press of  India,  on  January  1,  1877. 

In  speaking  of  the  British  attitude  towards  the  problems 
raised  by  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano,  we  quoted  Disraeli's 
explanation  of  why  British  foreign  policy  had  to  adapt 
itself  to  the  situation  created  in  Asia  by  the  queen's  new 
responsibilities.  In  reahty  the  policy  went  back  to  the 
aftermath  of  the  Napoleonic  wars,  and  the  proclamation  of 
January  1,  1877,  was  the  logical  result  of  an  evolution  that 
had  begun  in  Asia  with  the  last  Mahratta  war  in  1818. 
India  could  be  made  secure  only  by  control  of  the  land  and 
sea  approaches  to  the  Indian  peninsula.    The  settlements 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)         75 

after  the  downfall  of  Napoleon  had  given  Great  Britain 
Malta  and  the  Ionian  Islands  in  the  Mediterranean,  the 
Cape  of  Good  Hope,  the  Seychelles,  Mauritius,  and  Ceylon. 
The  Ionian  Islands  were  ceded  to  Greece  in  1863,  but 
Cyprus  was  occupied  in  1878.  Owing  to  changed  condi- 
tions through  the  piercing  of  the  Isthmus  of  Suez  in  1869, 
Cyprus  had  become  a  vantage-point  of  importance.  But 
Disraeli  had  already  taken  another  step  to  control  the  new 
route  to  India  by  purchasing  the  Khedive  Ismail's  shares 
in  the  Suez  Canal  Company  in  1875. 

In  the  regions  between  Egypt  and  India,  the  British  had 
been  working  with  admirable  foresight  and  energy  for  half 
a  century  before  the  Suez  Canal  was  cut.  Control  of  the 
Eed  Sea  was  secured  by  the  occupation  of  Aden  in  1839, 
and  in  the  following  year  the  East  India  Company  pre- 
empted the  opposite  African  coast  by  binding  the  native 
chiefs  to  a  promise  not  to  enter  into  treaty  relations  with 
other  powers.  To  neutralize  other  European  influences  the 
British  were  led  to  declare  war  against  Abyssinia  in  1868. 
The  king  was  killed  and  his  heir  taken  captive  to  England, 
where  he  died.  In  1873  the  sultan  of  Zanzibar  made  a 
treaty  with  the  British,  and  in  1877  London  recognized 
Egyptian  jurisdiction  over  Somaliland,  provided  that  no 
territories  of  Egypt  "be  ceded  on  any  pretext  whatever  to 
a  foreign  power." 

The  occupation  of  Aden  was  preceded  and  followed  by 
diplomatic  activity,  made  possible  through  cooperation  of 
the  navy,  around  the  Arabian  peninsula.  The  first  treaty 
of  peace  with  Arab  chiefs  of  the  Persian  Gulf  was  made 
in  1820.  It  was  reaffirmed  in  1853,  and  in  1861,  despite 
the  violent  protest  of  Turkey,  the  sheik  of  Bahrein  put 
himself  under  British  protection.  In  1854  the  sultan  of 
Muscat  ceded  the  Kuria  Muria  Islands,  and  in  1876  the 
sultan  of  Kishin  gave  Sokotra  to  the  British.  In  all  agree- 
ments with  the  Red  Sea  and  Persian  Gulf  chiefs  there  was 
the  same  clause,  namely,  that  no  treaties,  concessions,  or 


76  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

negotiations  be  entered  into  with  any  European  power 
other  than  Great  Britain  mthout  the  consent  of  the  gov- 
-^rnment  of  India.  Wlien  Napoleon  III  was  at  the  height 
of  his  power,  in  1862,  Great  Britain  agreed  with  France 
to  respect  the  independence  of  Muscat  and  Zanzibar.  But 
eleven  years  later  the  sultan  of  Muscat  accepted  a  British 
subsidy,  and  Zanzibar  eventually  came  under  British  pro- 
tection. The  government  of  India  was  virtually  master 
of  the  Persian  Gulf,  and  had  extended  its  influence  along 
the  Arabian  sea-coast  of  Persia  before  the  Russo-Turkish 
War  of  1877.  The  effort  to  shut  Russia  off  from  the 
Indian  Ocean  and  from  the  countries  contiguous  to  India 
required  two  serious  wars  with  Afghanistan,  in  1839-42 
and  1878-80;  a  war  with  Persia  in  1856-57;  the  extension 
of  British  control  to  the  northwest  frontier ;  and  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  protectorate  over  Baluchistan.  In  the  cam- 
paign of  1839  against  the  Afghans  the  British  felt  that  it 
was  necessary  to  protect  the  flank  of  their  expedition  by 
seizing  Kalat.  A  treaty  was  signed  with  the  khan  of  Kalat 
in  1840  and  renewed  in  1854  and  1876.  The  first  was  sim- 
ply a  defensive  treaty,  the  second  an  offensive  and  defen- 
sive alliance,  with  a  subsidy  for  the  khan,  and  the  third 
allowed  the  British  the  right  of  intervention  and  gave  them 
the  northeastern  corner  of  Baluchistan,  where  Quetta  be- 
came a  strong  fortress,  linked  with  Karachi  by  rail,  to 
serve  to  watch  the  future  relations  between  Afghans  and 
Russians. 

On  the  eastern  side  of  India  the  British  began  to  extend 
their  influence  in  1824  by  invading  Burma,  which  was  finally 
annexed  after  the  capture  of  Rangoon  in  1852.  The  leas- 
ing of  the  island  of  Singapore  from  the  sultan  of  Johore 
in  1824  was  a  master  stroke  of  far-sightedness.  When 
Hong-Kong  was  added  sixteen  years  later  by  conquest 
from  China,  the  British  had  laid  the  foundation  for  un- 
rivaled naval  and  mercantile  supremacy  from  England  to 
the  Far  East,  both  by  the  Mediterranean  and  by  the  Cape 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)         77 

of  Good  Hope.  The  various  sultanates  between  the  end  of 
the  Malay  peninsula  and  Burma  were  gradually  incoi'po- 
rated  in  the  British  Empire  by  treaties  with  the  Malay 
sovereigns  and  Siam.  Along  the  sea  route,  the  Andaman 
Islands  were  annexed  in  1858;  Labuan  was  occupied,  de- 
spite the  protest  of  Spain  and  Holland,  in  1847;  and  a 
foothold  was  obtained  on  the  northern  tip  of  Borneo  in 
1878  by  a  treaty  between  the  Labuan  Trading  Company 
and  the  sultan  of  Sulu. 

On  the  northern  side  of  India  the  British  secured  the 
right  to  maintain  a  resident  in  Nepal  by  the  treaty  of 
Segowlie  in  1815,  and  Ghurkas  had  been  recruited  for  the 
Indian  army.  In  1864  eleven  provinces  of  Bhutan  were 
annexed  to  Bengal,  and  in  the  following  year  the  Bhutan 
government  accepted  a  subsidy  from  Calcutta.  It  has  been 
under  virtual  British  control  ever  since.  Attempts  were 
made  to  open  up  trade  between  India  and  Tibet  in  1872 
and  1873.  But,  as  Tibet  belonged  nominally  to  China,  an 
agreement  was  made  at  Chef  oo  in  1876  between  China  and 
Great  Britain  for  exploration  in  this  country,  in  which  the 
British  greatly  feared  the  penetration  of  Russian  influence. 
Tibetan  fanaticism  prevented  British  and  Russians  alike 
from  exploration  and  propaganda.  The  remoteness  of  the 
country  made  conquest  by  arms  impracticable. 

The  development  of  Austraha  and  New  Zealand,  the 
founding  of  British  Columbia,  the  increasing  importance 
of  Hong-Kong  and  Singapore,  and  especially  the  invention 
of  marine  telegraph  communication,  caused  the  British  to 
realize,  during  the  last  decade  of  the  period  under  survey, 
the  advisability  of  the  extension  of  their  sovereignty  over 
islands  in  the  Pacific.  The  convention  of  London,  in  1814, 
had  left  the  East  Indies  to  the  Dutch,  and  the  Philippines 
had  not  been  taken  from  Spain.  British  exploration, 
notably  the  voyage  of  Captain  Cook,  did  much  to  make  the 
Pacific  islands  kno^vn  to  Europe.  The  first  actual  British 
possession  in  the  Pacific  was  Pitcairn  Island,  annexed  in 


78  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

1838.  A  naval  captain  hoisted  the  British  flag  over  the 
Hawaiian  Islands  in  1843,  but  the  act  was  disavowed  by 
London.  A  foothold  was  secured  on  the  south  coast  of 
New  Guinea,  owing  to  proximity  to  Australia,  in  1846,  and 
the  earlier  settlers  of  New  Zealand  gathered  in  the  islands 
in  their  general  neighborhood.  Until  the  era  of  cables, 
however,  nobody  was  much  concerned  about  the  more  re- 
mote Pacific  archipelagos,  whose  exploitation  would  bring 
little  profit. 

The  first  important  step  in  the  extension  of  the  Brit- 
ish Empire  to  Oceania  was  the  annexation  of  the  Fiji 
Islands  in  1874.  France,  who  had  just  begun  active 
empire-building  in  Indo-China,  had  been  picking  up  Pacific 
islands  since  1840.  The  French  were  well  estabhshed  in 
New  Caledonia  and  the  South  Sea  islands.  In  the  year 
foUomng  the  British  coup  in  the  Fijis,  the  British  and 
French  began  to  colonize — or,  rather,  to  pay  attention  to 
their  missionary  work — in  the  New  Hebrides.  John  Paton, 
a  Scotch  missionary,  proposed  to  make  the  New  Hebrides 
British  in  1877.  But  the  French  protested.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  British  were  able  to  take  advantage  of  this  claim 
and  others  that  they  were  willing  to  forego,  to  secure  inter- 
national assent  to  the  annexation  of  Union,  Ellice,  Gilbert, 
southern  Solomon,  and  other  groups,  over  which  they  had 
discovery  and  trading  claims  that  had  never  been  pressed. 
The  agreement  of  1877  established  the  British  Empire  on 
a  wide  and  firm  basis  in  the  mid-Pacific. 

In  the  earlier  days,  before  the  interior  of  Africa  was  ex- 
plored and  before  the  great  value  of  African  raw  materials 
became  apparent,  the  British  did  little  to  extend  the  colo- 
nies which  they  had  acquired  on  the  way  to  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope.  But  their  activities  along  the  west  African 
coast,  in  connection  with  the  suppression  of  the  slave  trade, 
accomplished  valuable  foundation  work  for  the  future.  We 
have  already  seen  how  Sierra  Leone  was  made  a  crown 
colony  in  1808,  and  how  the  transfers  of  territory  at  the 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  79 

end  of  the  Napoleonic  wars  led  to  new  frontiers  for  Gam- 
bia and  the  founding  of  Bathurst  in  1816.  The  French 
withdrew  from  Gambia  finally  in  1857,  but  without  a  defi- 
nite delimitation  of  frontiers.  In  the  meantime  France 
was  developing  the  Senegal  settlements  that  had  been  re- 
turned to  her  in  1817.  In  1831  British  explorers  and  mer- 
chants began  to  discover  the  potentialities  of  the  Niger 
Valley.  The  Gold  Coast  forts  were  taken  over  by  the 
crown  in  1843,  Danish  rights  were  acquired  in  1850,  and 
Dutch  rights  in  1871.  This  led  to  the  Ashanti  War  in 
1873-74,  when  the  king  was  compelled  to  acknowledge  Great 
Britain's  supremacy  on  the  coast.  Lagos  Island  was  seized 
in  1861,  and  the  United  Africa  Company  was  founded  in 
1879,  with  the  object  of  developing  British  trade  at  the 
expense  of  less  united  rivals.  It  was  just  in  time  to  get 
ahead  of  the  Germans  and  French,  the  latter  backed  by 
their  government. 

British  enterprise  in  the  interior  of  Africa  also  prepared 
the  way  for  the  expansion  of  a  later  period.  Livingstone 
discovered  Lake  Nyasa  in  1859,  and  Stanley  reached 
Uganda  in  1875.  The  African  Lakes  Corporation  was 
founded  in  1878.  The  first  maps  of  these  regions  were 
hardly  drawn  when  British  missionaries,  who  had  been 
working  successfully  in  Zanzibar,  penetrated  the  African 
continent.  At  the  same  time  Baker  and  Gordon,  in  the 
employ  of  the  Egyptian  khedive  Ismail,  explored,  fought 
for,  and  established  administrative  control  over  the  Sudan. 
These  activities  were  to  bear  fruit  for  Great  Britain  later. 

In  America,  the  three  colonies  taken  from  Holland  on  the 
South  American  coast,  south  of  Venezuela,  were  organized 
into  British  Guiana.  With  the  remainder  of  the  Dutch 
possessions  and  French  Guiana  beyond,  this  constituted 
the  only  European  title  on  the  continent  of  South  America. 
The  boundary  on  the  north  with  Venezuela  had  never  been 
definitely  settled,  and  after  eighty  years  it  almost  brought 
Great  Britain  into  conflict  with  the  United  States.    A  sev- 


80  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

enteenth-century  settlement  of  British  log-cutters  on  the 
west  coast  of  Central  America  had  an  indefinite  political 
status  until  1860,  when  Great  Britain  surrendered  a  part 
of  her  claims  there  to  the  republics  of  Honduras  and  Nica- 
ragua. British  Honduras  was  declared  a  colony  under 
the  governor  of  Jamaica  in  1862,  and  was  made  a  crown 
colony  in  1870.  Owing  to  Britain's  large  interests  in  the 
West  Indies  and  the  Caribbean  Sea,  the  Foreign  Office  had, 
for  a  long  time  before  the  final  Honduras  settlement,  been 
claiming  virtually  all  of  the  Nicaraguan  coast.  When  the 
United  States  was  negotiating  for  canal  rights,  made  im- 
portant by  the  annexation  of  California  in  1848,  the  vague 
British  claims  had  blocked  her  effort.  The  British  were  in 
possession  of  a  settlement  called  Greytown,  which  was  at 
the  mouth  of  the  San  Juan  River,  the  proposed  Atlantic  ter- 
minus of  the  canal.  This  de  facto  advantage  was  given  up 
when  the  United  States  agreed,  in  the  Clayton-Bulwer 
treaty  of  1850,  to  renounce  exclusive  control  over  the  canal ; 
not  to  fortify  it ;  to  neutralize  it ;  to  maintain  equal  tolls  for 
all  nations;  and  not  to  colonize  in,  or  establish  a  protec- 
torate over,  or  make  an  exclusive  alliance  with,  Nicaragua, 
Costa  Rica,  the  Mosquito  Coast,  or  any  other  Central 
American  state.  When  the  American  Civil  War  broke  out 
Great  Britain  agreed  with  France  and  Spain  to  intervene  in 
Mexico.  But  Great  Britain  and  Spain  withdrew  when 
France  declared  war  upon  Mexico  in  the  following  year. 

Our  summary  of  British  colonial  expansion  from  1815  to 
1878  has  tended  to  be  a  mere  chronicle  of  events,  with  a 
monotonous  succession  of  names  and  dates.  Limitation  of 
space  has  compelled  us  to  resist  the  temptation  of  trying  to 
explain  the  cross-currents  of  opinion  in  England  concern- 
ing colonial  expansion.  The  building  up  of  the  British  Em- 
pire, as  we  have  traced  it,  was  not  accomplished  without 
opposition,  or  with  any  universal  expectation  of  the  results 
that  have  actually  crowned  the  work  of  the  empire-builders. 
For  some  years  before  the  Crimean  War,  and  with  in- 


BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1815-1878)  81 

creased  energy  after  the  blunders  and  sacrifices  of  the 
Crimean  expedition,  the  Liberals  of  the  Manchester  school 
advanced  the  thesis  that  self-governing  institutions  in  the 
colonies  were  a  preliminary  to  separation.  Why  should 
the  Enghsh  people  consent  to  an  almost  endless  succession 
of  colonial  wars  to  add  to  the  empire?  And  why  should 
this  incessant  activity  overseas  be  allowed  to  disturb  Great 
Britain's  friendly  relations  with  the  continental  European 
powers?  In  their  opposition  to  the  new  economic  impe- 
rialism, the  Liberals  did  not  sound  the  humanitarian  note 
alone.  They  questioned  the  value  to  the  United  Kingdom 
of  colonial  expansion,  and  they  believed  that  the  world- 
encircling  structure,  built  at  so  great  a  cost,  would  not 
prove  durable. 

On  the  other  hand,  while  British  statesmen  were  using 
diplomacy  and  force  to  defend  and  develop  old  rights  and 
acquire  new  ones,  they  were  able  to  point  out  to  the  British 
people  moral  and  material  progress  in  the  relations  of 
Great  Britain  with  the  ever-expanding  possessions  in  all 
parts  of  the  world.  Slavery  in  the  colonies  was  abolished 
in  1834;  the  old  navigation  laws  were  repealed  in  1849; 
differential  duties  in  favor  of  colonial  products  were  re- 
moved in  1860;  and  the  Royal  Colonial  Institution  was 
founded  in  1868. 

The  new  impulsion  to  British  imperial  development  came 
with  the  increase  of  influence  of  Benjamin  Disraeli,  later 
Lord  Beaconsfield.  As  early  as  1866,  two  years  before  his 
first  premiership,  Disraeli  said  that  England  was  now 
**more  of  an  Asiatic  than  a  European  power."  He  em- 
phasized— as  did  Joseph  Chamberlain  thirty  years  later — 
the  glorious  future  of  the  British  Empire  if  it  were  held 
together  as  a  political  system  and  extended  in  such  a  way 
that  it  would  function  to  the  advantage  of  all  its  parts  the 
world  over.  In  1872  Disraeli  declared  that  ''no  minister 
in  this  country  Avill  do  his  duty  who  neglects  any  oppor- 
tunity of  reconstructing  as  much  as  possible  our  colonial 


82  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

empire,  and  of  responding  to  those  distant  sympathies 
which  may  become  the  source  of  incalculable  strength  and 
happiness  to  this  island."  Believing  that  the  privileges  of 
empire  were  worth  the  responsibilities,  as  prime  minister 
Beaconsfield  assumed  the  responsibilities.  His  successors 
could  not  get  away  from  them. 


CHAPTER  VI 

CONSOLIDATION  OF  BRITISH  POWER  IN  THE  NEAR  EAST 

(1878-1885) 

DURING  the  nineteenth  century  was  developed  the 
British  policy  of  becoming  mistress  of  every  ap- 
proach to  India  by  land  and  sea.  In  point  of  fact,  the  policy 
was  largely  unconscious  and  instinctive.  But  the  result 
was  as  logical  an  evolution  towards  a  goal  as  if  every  step 
had  been  thought  out.  In  tracing  British  colonial  expan- 
sion from  the  Congress  of  Vienna  (1815)  to  the  Congress 
of  Berlin  (1878),  we  have  shown  how  British  diplomacy, 
backed  unhesitatingly  by  force  whenever  necessary,  en- 
deavored to  safeguard  India  and  to  gain  a  monopoly  of 
the  routes  to  India.  The  method  was  threefold:  (1)  to  se- 
cure sovereignty  over  vantage-points  on  mainland  or 
islands,  strategically  placed  for  dominating  ocean  thor- 
oughfares and  for  coaling  stations  and  naval  bases;  (2)  to 
extend  political  and  economic  control  over  the  countries 
bordering  on  India  and  those  through  which  any  other 
European  power  might  reach  waterways  leading  to  India ; 
and  (3)  to  frustrate  the  attempts  of  other  European  pow- 
ers to  secure  preponderant  political  influence  or  economic 
position  in  any  country  bordering  on  India  or  along  the 
water  routes  to  India. 

Prior  to  the  Congress  of  Berlin,  British  statesmen  had 
believed  that  the  negative  method  of  forbidding  others  to 
trespass  was  the  best  means  of  safeguarding  the  approaches 
to  India  in  the  Near  East.  In  eighty  years  their  efforts 
to  maintain  the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  had  pro- 
duced two  wars  and  two  threats  of  wars.  France  was 
fought  in  Egypt  at  the  beginning  of  the  century,  and  the 

83 


84  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

British  were  ready  to  enter  into  another  war  with  her  at 
the  time  of  Mehemet  AU's  second  attack  upon  Turkey  in 
1839-40.  Russia  was  fought  in  the  Crimea  in  the  middle 
of  the  century,  and  the  British  were  ready  to  enter  into 
another  war  when  the  czar's  ministers  imposed  the  treaty 
of  San  Stefano  upon  Turkey  in  1878. 

During  the  two  decades  between  the  Congress  of  Paris, 
which  followed  the  Crimean  War,  and  the  Congress  of  Ber- 
lin, which  followed  the  Russo-Turkish  War,  changes  in  the 
political  aspects  of  the  Near  Eastern  question  made  it  ad- 
visable to  abandon  the  tactics  of  merely  opposing  the  in- 
trigues of  continental  European  powers  in  the  Ottoman  Em- 
pire and  its  dependencies.  British  public  opinion,  suscep- 
tible to  the  appeal  of  suffering  humanity  to  the  point  of 
overthrowing  a  cabinet,  was  becoming  less  credulous  of 
Turkish  promises  to  reform.  When  the  Crimean  War  was 
fought  it  was  believed  that  Turkey  had  not  been  given  a 
chance  to  show  how  she  could  behave  in  her  relations  with 
her  Christian  subjects.  But  the  revelations  of  Turkish  mas- 
sacres in  the  Balkans  in  1875-76,  which  Mr.  Gladstone  cap- 
italized in  his  opposition  to  the  foreign  policy  of  the  Dis- 
raeli cabinet,  proved  to  Conservative  and  Liberal  states- 
men alike  the  impossibility  of  continuing  the  unconditional 
championship  of  the  sovereignty  and  territorial  integrity 
of  the  sultan's  dominions. 

Whatever  treaties  might  say  concerning  the  suzerainty 
or  sovereignty  of  the  sultan,  it  was  clear  that  the  Balkan 
peoples  were  no  longer  to  be  checkmated  in  their  struggles 
for  independent  national  existence.  The  Balkan  peoples 
belonged  to  the  Orthodox  Church,  and  part  of  them  were 
of  Slavic  blood.  The  Congress  of  Berlin  had  revised  the 
treaty  of  San  Stefano,  which  proposed  to  create  a  Bulgaria 
that  would  include  a  large  part  of  Macedonia  and  Thrace ; 
but  nothing  could  take  away  from  Russia,  so  British 
statesmen  felt,  the  advantages  of  kinship  and  common  re- 
ligion enjoyed  in  the  Balkans. 


BRITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST  (1878-1885)  85 

The  treaty  of  Berlin  was  a  setback  for  Russian  aspira- 
tions in  the  Balkans.  But  it  did  not  deprive  Russia  of  any 
material  portion  of  her  territorial  gains  at  the  expense  of 
Turkey  in  Asia.  By  article  LVIII  Russia  secured  the  ter- 
ritories of  Ardahan,  Kars,  and  Batum,  and  thus  came  into 
possession  of  northern  Persia's  trade  route  to  the  outer 
world.  Control  of  Batum  made  feasible,  too,  railroad  de- 
velopment into  central  Asia,  which  would  bring  Russia 
to  the  frontiers  of  Afghanistan. 

The  Suez  Canal  created  a  new  problem  for  British  di- 
plomacy. When  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps,  who  had  obtained 
a  concession  for  the  canal  from  Said  Pasha,  viceroy  of 
Egypt,  failed  to  secure  the  necessary  confirmation  of  the 
sultan  of  Turkey,  he  realized  that  the  British  were  in- 
triguing against  him.  He  went  to  London  to  induce  the 
British  government  to  withdraw  its  opposition.  Lord 
Palmerston  told  him  that  the  canal  was  a  physical  impos- 
sibility, that  if  it  could  be  dug  it  would  injure  British 
maritime  supremacy,  and  that  the  proposal  w^as  a  device 
for  French  interference  in  the  Near  East.  Despite  British 
hostility  and  the  refusal  of  London  bankers  to  cooperate 
in  financing  the  project,  de  Lesseps  carried  it  to  a  success- 
ful completion.  The  canal  was  opened  in  1869,  and  within 
a  few  years  it  became  self-supporting.  In  1875,  by  excel- 
lent statesmanship  taking  advantage  of  a  lucky  oppor- 
tunity, the  British  government  purchased  the  shares  of 
the  Egyptian  khedive  and  became  the  largest  stockholder 
in  the  Suez  Canal  Company.  The  new  trade  route  through 
Egypt  and  the  Red  Sea  suddenly  increased  immeasurably 
the  importance  of  the  Near  East  in  British  imperial  policy. 

To  recapitulate,  after  the  Russo-Turkish  War  of  1877-78 
the  traditional  British  policy  of  supporting  the  integrity 
of  the  sultan's  dominions  was  abandoned  because:  main- 
tenance of  the  old  policy  had  become  a  serious  political 
risk  for  a  cabinet;  tangible  compensation  must  be  sought 
within  the  Ottoman  Empire  to  offset  the  Russian  influence 


86  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

in  the  Balkans  and  the  Russian  menace  in  central  Asia; 
and  the  Suez  Canal,  which  in  a  few  years  had  become  a 
vital  artery  to  the  British  Empire,  must  be  brought  under 
British  military  control. 

The  consolidation  of  British  power  in  the  Near  East, 
which  resulted  in  checking  Russian  penetration  into  Ar- 
menia and  Afghanistan  and  in  ousting  French  influence 
from  Egypt,  was  accomplished  by  the  Cyprus  convention, 
the  Second  Afghan  War,  and  the  military  occupation  of 
Egypt.  The  Cyprus  convention  was  a  defensive  alliance 
between  Great  Britain  and  Turkey  with  respect  to  the 
Asiatic  provinces  of  Turkey.  Although  signed  on  June  4, 
1878,  nine  days  before  the  Congress  of  Berlin  met,  it  was 
not  communicated  to  the  powers  until  after  their  represen- 
tatives had  begun  the  work  of  revising  the  treaty  of  San 
Stefano.  The  convention  contained  only  one  article,  which 
read: 

'*If  Batum,  Ardahan,  Kars,  or  any  of  them  shall  be  re- 
tained by  Russia,  and  if  any  attempt  shall  be  made  at  any 
future  time  by  Russia  to  take  possession  of  further  terri- 
tories of  H.  I.  M.  the  Sultan  in  Asia  as  fixed  by  the  Defini- 
tive Treaty  of  Peace,  England  engages  to  join  H.  I.  M. 
the  Sultan  in  defending  them  by  force  of  arms. 

"In  return,  H.  I.  M.  the  Sultan  promises  to  England  to 
introduce  necessary  reforms,  to  be  agreed  upon  later  be- 
tween the  two  Powers,  into  the  Government  and  for  the 
protection  of  the  Christian  and  other  subjects  of  the  Porte 
in  those  territories.  And  in  order  to  enable  England  to 
make  necessary  provision  for  executing  her  engagements, 
H.  I.  M.  the  Sultan  further  consents  to  assign  the  Island 
of  Cyprus  to  be  occupied  and  administered  by  England." 

In  an  annex,  added  July  1,  1878,  the  permanency  of  the 
British  title  was  made  more  definite  by  the  provision  ''that, 
if  Russia  restores  to  Turkey  Kars  and  the  other  conquests 
made  by  her  in  Armenia  during  the  last  war,  the  Island  of 
Cyprus  will  be  evacuated  by  England  and  the  Convention 
of  June  4,  1878,  will  be  at  an  end. ' ' 


BRITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST  (1878-1885)  87 

Of  course,  it  was  kno^vll  that  the  Russians  had  no  inten- 
tion of  giving  back  to  Turkey  the  territories  mentioned  in 
the  convention  and  its  annex.  The  Cyprus  convention  was 
an  acknowledgment  of  the  abandonment  of  the  policy  of 
maintaining  the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  and  it 
substituted  the  policy  of  compensation,  which  was  in  the 
next  generation  to  become  the  accepted  rule  in  dealing  with 
China  and  any  other  state  unable  to  defend  itself.  A  Euro- 
pean power  protests  against  the  violation  of  a  weak  state 's 
territorial  integrity  by  another  European  power;  but,  un- 
able or  unwilling  to  prevent  it,  the  protesting  power  makes 
an  academic  profession  of  the  intention  of  protecting  the 
despoiled  state,  in  return  for  which  it  receives  some  other 
portion  of  the  victim's  territory. 

Follo^\dng  the  Cj'prus  convention,  Great  Britain  had  to 
compensate  France  for  the  extension  of  British  power  in 
the  Mediterranean.  This  was  done  by  an  agreement  be- 
tween Salisbury  and  Waddington,  who  represented  France 
at  the  Congress  of  Berlin,  that  Great  Britain's  occupation 
of  Cyprus  would  be  accepted  by  France  and  France  would 
be  given  a  free  hand  in  Tunisia.  This  policy,  also,  was  to 
become  common  usage  in  world  politics.  Powers  would  ac- 
cept as  accomplished  facts — faits  accomplis,  in  the  lan- 
guage of  diplomacy — acts  of  aggression  against  weak 
states,  in  return  for  the  assurance  that  similar  acts  con- 
templated by  them  would  not  be  opposed. 

Because  Afghanistan  does  not  belong  geographically  to 
the  Near  East,  and  because  British  diplomacy  and  military 
intervention  in  Afghanistan,  as  well  as  in  Persia  and  the 
Persian  Gulf,  has  been  managed  from  India,  little  if  any 
mention  is  made  of  this  country  in  books  dealing  with  the 
Near  East.  The  jurisdiction  of  the  government  of  India 
has  been  extended  as  far  west  as  Aden,  at  the  entrance  of 
the  Red  Sea.^     But  it  is  difficult  to  exclude  Afghanistan 

^  For  this  reason,  during  the  earlier  stages  of  the  recent  World  War,  the  mili- 
tary operations  of  the  British  in  Mesopotamia  were  directed  from  India. 


88  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

from  a  survey  of  the  development  of  British  power  in  the 
Near  East.  This  is  especially  true  of  the  years  immedi- 
ately following  the  Congress  of  Berlin.  Afghanistan  af- 
fected Persia,  and  Persia  affected  Turkey.  Along  the  line 
from  the  Balkans  to  the  Himalayas  the  relations  between 
Great  Britain  and  Russia  must  be  studied  as  a  whole. 

Hence  we  find  that  when  the  British  stopped  the  Rus- 
sians at  the  gates  of  Constantinople  and  held  up  the  exe- 
cution of  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano,  the  Russians  sent  an 
envoy  into  Afghanistan  to  make  a  treaty  with  the  amir. 
The  rivalry  between  Great  Britain  and  Russia  for  the  con- 
trol of  Afghanistan,  which  had  begun  forty  years  earlier, 
was  not  discussed  at  the  Congress  of  Berlin.  The  British 
refused  to  allow  the  status  of  Afghanistan  to  become  an 
international  problem  and  contended  that  the  Afghans,  be- 
cause their  country  bordered  on  India,  must  ally  them- 
selves solely  with  Great  Britain.  In  November,  1878,  when 
a  British  envoy  sent  to  the  amir  for  the  purpose  of  con- 
cluding such  an  alliance  was  turned  back  at  the  frontier, 
the  British  declared  war  and  invaded  Afghanistan. 

After  a  vigorous  winter  campaign  the  invaders  were  able 
to  put  upon  the  throne  at  Kabul  one  of  the  amir's  sons,  who 
signed  a  treaty  transferring  parts  of  the  provinces  bor- 
dering on  India  to  Great  Britain,  and  agreeing  to  place  in 
the  hands  of  the  British  government  the  entire  control  of 
his  foreign  relations.  To  prevent  future  Russian  intrigue, 
the  new  amir  was  compelled  to  accept  a  permanent  British 
legation  at  Kabul.  The  Afghans,  however,  murdered  the 
British  envoy,  with  his  staff  and  escort.  The  war  began 
again,  and  the  British  occupied  Kabul.  Another  member 
of  the  ruling  family,  who  had  been  in  exile,  was  induced  to 
return  to  Kabul,  and  was  made  amir  in  return  for  the  rec- 
ognition of  Britain's  exclusive  right  to  control  the  foreign 
affairs  of  Afghanistan.  British  troops,  however,  had  to  be 
used  until  the  end  of  1881  to  defend  the  new  amir,  in  a  civil 


BRITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST   (1878-1885)  89 

war  that  proved  long  and  costly,  against  other  claimants  to 
the  throne. 

Public  opinion  in  England  had  hailed  Lord  Beaconsfield 
as  a  statesman  who  won  great  advantages  without  blood- 
shed through  the  revision  of  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano  and 
the  Cyprus  convention,  and  then  turned  against  him  within 
two  years  after  the  ratification  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin. 
For  British  diplomatic  and  military  prestige  had  suffered 
a  severe  blow  in  south  Africa.  In  1879  the  Zulus  completely 
defeated  a  British  army  and  the  Boers  refused  to  accept 
the  annexation  of  the  Transvaal.  Beaconsfield  had  also  to 
shoulder  the  burden  of  the  unsatisfactory  Afghan  war,  with 
its  repeated  surprises  and  reverses.  He  went  out  of  office 
in  April,  1880,  after  an  electoral  campaign  in  which  Glad- 
stone, referring  to  Cjnpi'us  and  the  Transvaal,  said:  *'If 
those  acquisitions  were  as  valuable  as  they  are  valueless, 
I  would  repudiate  them,  because  they  were  obtained  by 
means  dishonorable  to  the  character  of  our  country." 

For  a  second  time  Gladstone  succeeded  Beaconsfield. 
During  the  six  years  (1874-80)  that  Gladstone  sat  on  the 
Opposition  front  bench,  he  had  consistently  criticized  the 
foreign  policy  of  Beaconsfield.  He  had  denounced  eco- 
nomic imperialism,  deplored  the  use  of  British  troops  in 
Asia  and  Africa,  declared  that  the  methods  of  British  di- 
plomacy were  un-English,  and  reiterated  in  and  out  of 
Parliament  his  belief  that  it  was  bad  morals  as  well  as  bad 
business  for  a  free  people  like  the  British  to  endeavor  to 
take  away  the  freedom  of  other  peoples.  And  j^et,  as  prime 
minister,  Gladstone  found  that,  irrespective  of  what  he 
might  say  in  speeches,  he  was  powerless  to  limit  or  arrest 
the  extension  and  consolidation  of  Britain's  overseas  em- 
pire. His  great  Liberal  folloAving  supported  him  and  kept 
him  in  office  until  1885.  It  gave  assent  in  press  and  Par- 
liament, and  from  pulpit  and  platform,  to  the  prime  min- 
ister's Golden  Eule  idealism:  in  foreign  policy,  only  what 


90  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

was  right  was  wise!  Nevertheless  this  sentiment  did  not 
translate  itself  into  a  reversal  of  the  foreign  policy  that 
had  been  denounced.  On  the  contrary,  the  Foreign  Office 
continued  to  use  the  army  and  navy,  as  before,  to  maintain 
the  existing  British  possessions  and  spheres  of  influence, 
and  even  to  add  to  the  empire.^ 

The  Egyptian  national  debt  was  begun  by  Said  Pasha, 
son  of  Mehemet  Ali,  who  borrowed  from  London  bankers 
a  little  more  than  $16,000,000,  at  a  discount  of  twenty  per 
cent.  Said,  and  his  nephew  Ismail,  who  succeeded  him  in 
1863,  found  it  easy  to  float  loans  through  European  bankers 
at  ruinous  rates  like  this.  Some  of  the  money  was  spent  on 
public  works  (contracts  were  often  awarded,  without  com- 
petitive bidding,  to  the  financial  groups  that  loaned  the 
money),  but  much  of  it  was  squandered.  It  took  only  twenty 
years  for  Egypt  to  become  bankrupt.  In  1875  Ismail  Pasha 
had  to  sell  out  everything  he  owned  to  satisfy  his  creditors, 
and  in  this  way  the  British  government  secured  his  Suez 
Canal  shares  for  a  cash  payment — none  of  which  went  to 
Egypt — that  was  scarcely  more  than  the  premium  paid  to 
London  bankers  for  the  first  small  Egyptian  loan.  In  1876, 
to  assure  the  payment  of  interest  to  European  bondholders, 
international  control  was  established  over  most  of  the 
revenues  of  Egypt.  Later  in  the  same  year  the  British  and 
French  established  a  dual  control  of  Eg}T)tian  finances. 
The  railroads  and  the  port  of  Alexandria  were  interna- 
tionalized. 

Khedive  Ismail  in  1879  attempted  to  rid  Egypt  of  foreign 
intervention  and  was  promptly  deposed.  France  and 
Great  Britain  put  his  nephew  Tewfik  Pasha  on  the  throne, 

^During  the  second  Gladstone  ministry  the  Afghan  and  Boer  wars  were 
continued;  Lord  Salisbury's  encouragement  to  France  to  invade  Tunisia  was 
not  repudiated;  British  power  was  firmly  established  in  Cyprus;  the  North 
Borneo  Company  was  given  a  royal  charter;  Basutoland  and  Bechuanaland 
were  placed  under  British  protection;  Tembuland  was  annexed;  and  the 
British  government  adopted  as  bellicose  an  attitude  towards  Russian  aggression 
on  the  Afghan  frontier  in  the  early  spring  of  1885  as  it  had  done  towards  the 
Eussian  advance  on  Constantinople  under  the  Beaeonsfield  ministry. 


BBITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST  (1878-1885:  91 

and  reestablished  the  dual  control.  In  1882  the  Egyptians 
revolted  against  the  conditions  under  which  they  were 
living.  They  were  led  by  agitators  to  believe  that  the  mis- 
government  and  heavy  taxation  from  which  they  were  suf- 
fering were  due  to  the  intervention  of  Europeans,  who  alone 
were  enjoying  the  benefits  of  the  new  canal,  of  the  railroads, 
and  of  the  commerce  of  Alexandria.  Egyptian  labor  and 
Eg5T)tian  money  had  dug  the  canal,  built  the  port,  and  made 
the  railroads.  Arabi  Pasha,  leader  of  the  anti-foreign 
movement,  compelled  the  khedive,  who  had  no  force  to  op- 
pose him,  to  make  him  a  member  of  the  cabinet.  A  mas- 
sacre of  foreigners  in  Alexandria  on  June  11,  1882,  led  to 
a  bombardment  of  the  port  by  the  British  fleet.  The  French 
fleet,  which  had  come  to  Alexandria  simultaneously  with  the 
British,  refrained  from  taking  part  in  the  demonstration. 

Pressure  was  brought  to  bear  upon  the  sultan  of  Tur- 
key, suzerain  of  Egypt,  to  send  troops  there  to  put  down 
the  insurrection.  If  the  anti-foreign  movement  was  suc- 
cessful, European  concessions  and  investments,  not  to 
speak  of  the  interest  on  the  national  debt,  would  be  made 
valueless.  When  the  sultan  refused,  the  British  govern- 
ment invited  France,  and  then  Italy,  to  take  part  in  a 
military  expedition  ''to  restore  the  khedive 's  authority." 
France  and  Italy  declined.  A  strong  British  force  was 
landed  in  the  Suez  Canal.  The  Egyptians  were  routed  at 
Tel-el-Kebir  on  September  13,  1882.  Arabi  Pasha  was  de- 
ported to  Ceylon.  The  British  authorities  assured  the 
khedive  that  they  wanted  only  to  restore  order  by  means 
of  making  secure  an  Egyptian  government  under  the  con- 
trol of  the  khedive. 

The  military  occupation  was  announced  to  the  people  of 
Egypt  as  temporary,  and  the  promise  was  given  that  the 
troops  would  be  withdra^wm  as  soon  as  tranquillity  was  re- 
established. Similar  assurances  were  given  to  the  sultan 
by  the  British  ambassador  at  Constantinople,  and  to  the 
European  powers  by  the  British  Foreign  Office.    Gladstone 


92  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

informed  Parliament  that  there  was  no  intention  to  remain 
in  Egj^pt,  because  this  ''would  be  absolutely  at  variance  with 
all  the  principles  of  Her  Majesty's  government  and  the 
pledges  we  have  given  Europe."  A  year  later  Gladstone 
told  Parliament  that  the  British  government  deplored  the 
talk  in  political  and  colonial  circles  about  holding  Egypt. 
"Wliile  explaining  that  circumstances  did  not  permit  the 
immediate  withdrawal  of  the  army  of  occupation,  he  de- 
clared that  the  idea  of  staying  in  Egypt  was  repugnant  to 
the  government.  He  concluded  his  speech  with  the  follow- 
ing statement  against  the  agitation  to  hold  Egypt : 

"We  are  against  it  on  the  ground  of  the  interests  of  Eng- 
land ;  we  are  against  it  on  the  ground  of  our  duty  to  Egypt ; 
we  are  against  it  on  the  ground  of  the  specific  and  solemn 
pledges  given  the  world  in  the  most  solemn  manner  and 
under  the  most  critical  circumstances,  pledges  which  have 
earned  for  us  the  confidence  of  Europe  during  the  course 
of  difficult  and  delicate  operations,  and  which,  if  one  pledge 
can  be  more  solemn  and  sacred  than  another,  special  sacred- 
ness  in  this  case  binds  us  to  observe." 

Gladstone  undoubtedly  believed  what  he  said.  He  needed 
to  give  this  assurance  especially  to  the  French,  who,  al- 
though it  was  their  o"svn  fault  that  they  had  not  participated 
in  the  suppression  of  Arabi  Pasha's  revolt,  were  loud  in 
their  condemnation  of  what  they  called  British  hypocrisy 
and  a  scheme  to  annex  Egj^pt.  The  assurances  of  Glad- 
stone did  not  satisfy  the  French  government,  which  pro- 
tested formally  against  the  abolition  of  the  dual  control  by 
the  khedive  in  January,  1883.  For  twenty  years  the  French 
made  trouble  for  the  British  in  Egypt  and  encouraged  the 
nationalist  movement.  After  having  financed  and  dug  the 
canal  and  having  for  over  half  a  century  enjoyed  a  privi- 
leged position,  the  French  could  not  reconcile  themselves  to 
seeing  others  reap  where  they  had  sown.  The  occupation 
of  Egypt  turned  France  against  Great  Britain  in  every 
part  of  the  world,  and  it  was  not  until  1904  that  the  French 


BRITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST  (1878-1885)  93 

government,  in  exchange  for  a  free  hand  in  Morocco,  ac- 
knowledged the  new  status  quo  on  the  Nile. 

The  occupation  of  Egjrpt  greatly  increased  British  in- 
terest in  the  problem  of  the  Sudan  and  made  possible  the 
developments  that  fifteen  years  later  brought  fame  to 
Kitchener  and  added  a  million  square  miles  to  British  hold- 
ings in  Africa.  From  the  southern  border  of  Egypt  to  the 
equator,  the  country  containing  the  Nile,  to  its  head- 
waters in  Lake  Albert  Nyanza,  is  now  called  the  Anglo- 
Egyptian  Sudan.  This  vast  territory,  which  owed  only  a 
nominal  allegiance  to  Turkey,  was  brought  under  Egj^p- 
tian  rule  by  Mehemet  Ali,  who  gave  the  country  an  outlet 
to  the  Red  Sea  by  leasing  from  the  sultan  the  ports  of  Sua- 
kim  and  Massawa.  The  authority  of  the  successors  of 
Mehemet  Ali  was  contested  by  the  Sudanese,  however, 
when  an  attempt  was  made  to  break  up  the  slave  trade. 
From  1869  to  1882  five  European  soldiers  of  fortune  played 
the  principal  roles  in  the  Sudan,  as  employees  of  the  khe- 
dive.  Baker  and  Gordon,  the  former  of  whom  had  a  Hun- 
garian wife,  were  Englishmen  of  energy  and  ability  and 
of  unusual  personality.  Schnitzer  (Emin  Pasha)  was  a 
German  naturalist,  Rudolf  Slatin  an  Austrian  in  his  early 
twenties,  and  Romolo  Gessi  an  Italian.  These  men  w^ere 
remarkably  successful  in  military  expeditions  and  in  ex- 
tending an  administrative  control  really  more  their  o^vn 
than  that  of  their  employer.  Gordon,  the  commanding 
figure  after  the  retirement  of  Sir  Samuel  Baker,  was  an 
officer  in  the  British  army,  and  entered  the  service  of  the 
khedive  with  the  consent  of  his  government. 

The  Arabi  Pasha  revolt  in  Egypt  occurred  at  the  same 
time  as  an  uprising  against  the  Egj^ptian  government  in 
the  Sudan.  Mohammed  Ahmed,  a  holy  man  who  felt  that 
he  had  been  insulted  by  some  official,  proclaimed  himself 
the  successor  of  the  Prophet,  or  Mahdi.  As  Cairo  was  im- 
potent, with  the  larger  part  of  its  army  preparing  to  oppose 
British  intervention,  no  troops  could  be  sent  to  put  down 


94  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  movement,  which  was  spreading  like  wild-fire.  After 
they  entered  Cairo  the  British  failed  to  pay  attention  to 
the  Sudan  insurrection.  Only  after  some  months  did  the 
Gladstone  government  agree  to  allow  an  Egyptian  army, 
under  the  command  of  a  British  officer,  Colonel  Hicks,  to 
move  against  the  Mahdi.  Hicks  was  defeated  and  killed 
in  November,  1883,  and  the  next  month  the  Mahdi  captured 
Slatin  in  Darfur.  This  led  the  Gladstone  ministry  to  de- 
cide that  Egypt  must  evacuate  the  Sudan.  The  British 
were  unwilling  to  aid  in  the  pacification  of  the  Mahdi,  and 
financial  interests  vetoed  the  spending  by  the  Egyptian 
government  of  the  large  sums  that  a  military  expedition 
would  have  demanded. 

Public  opinion  in  England,  however,  quickly  realized  that 
this  entailed  a  responsibility  for  the  safe  withdrawal  of 
EgjqDtian  officials  and  their  families,  and  of  military  garri- 
sons still  resisting  the  Mahdi.  General  Gordon,  whose 
earlier  exploits  in  the  Sudan  and  elsewhere  had  fired  the 
imagination  of  the  English,  was  intrusted  mth  the  task  of 
an  honorable  evacuation,  that  is,  of  seeing  that  none  should 
be  left  behind  at  the  mercy  of  the  Mahdi.  Gordon  arrived 
in  Khartum  in  February,  1884.  He  succeeded  in  getting 
out  most  of  the  women  and  children  before  the  lines  of 
communication  with  Egypt  were  cut.  From  March,  1884, 
to  January,  1885,  Gordon,  besieged  in  Khartum,  held  out 
against  the  Mahdi.  Although  powerful  influences  in  press 
and  Parliament  were  clamoring  for  immediate  intervention 
of  a  British  army,  for  some  months  nothing  was  done  to 
send  him  relief.  On  January  28,  1885,  when  the  British 
column  reached  Khartum,  they  found  that  the  town  had 
been  captured  two  days  earlier  and  its  garrison  killed. 
There  was  nothing  to  do  but  retire. 

The  death  of  Gordon  made  a  lasting  impression  in  Eng- 
land. Owing  to  the  uncertainty  of  the  British  position  in 
Egj^Dt,  nothing  was  done  immediately  to  avenge  him.  More 
than  a  decade  later,  when  the  temporary  occupation  had 


BRITISH  POWER  IN  NEAR  EAST  (1878-1885)         95 

continued  long  enough  to  become  a  fait  accompli,  economic 
as  well  as  political  considerations  compelled  the  British 
government  to  turn  its  attention  to  the  pacification  of  the 
Sudan.  "What  these  considerations  were,  we  shall  see  later. 
But,  in  the  minds  of  the  British  people,  their  title  to  the 
Sudan,  even  though  they  were  not  in  actual  possession, 
could  not  be  contested  by  any  other  European  power. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908) 

RADETSKY,  in  his  memoirs,  summed  up  the  attitude 
of  Russia  towards  the  Ottoman  Empire  in  words  that 
give  the  key  to  the  Eastern  question  during  the  nineteenth 
century : 

*' Owing  to  her  geographical  position,  Russia  is  the  nat- 
ural and  eternal  enemy  of  Turkey.  ,  .  .  Russia  must 
therefore  do  all  she  can  to  take  possession  of  Constanti- 
nople, for  its  possession  alone  wall  grant  to  her  the  security 
and  territorial  completeness  necessary  for  her  future." 

Three  times  during  the  century  Russia  endeavored  to 
destroy  the  Ottoman  Erapire  so  that  she  might  gain  control 
of  the  exit  to  the  ^gean  Sea  and  extend  her  sphere  of  in- 
fluence to  the  Adriatic  through  the  Balkans  and  to  the 
Mediterranean  through  Armenia.  In  each  of  the  three 
wars— 1828-29,  1854-55,  1877-78— Turkey  was  saved  by  the 
intervention  of  other  European  powers. 

The  most  consistent  opponent  of  the  Russian  ambition  to 
expand  at  the  expense  of  Turkey  was  Great  Britain.  In 
every  crisis  in  the  Near  East,  British  statesmen  opposed 
Russian  policy.  They  were  determined  not  to  have  the 
Russian  navy  in  the  Mediterranean,  and  they  feared  that 
the  interest  of  Russia  in  the  oppressed  Christian  subjects 
of  Turkey  was  political  rather  than  humanitarian.  But 
they  had  to  reckon  mth  public  opinion  at  home,  which  was 
loath  to  see  Britain  in  defense  of  the  integrity  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire,  stifling  the  aspirations  of  the  Balkan 
peoples,  and  subjecting  the  Armenians  and  other  Chris- 
tians of  Asiatic  Turkey  to  servitude  and  the  danger  of  mas- 

96 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)  97 

sacre.  Hence  the  British  government  kept  insisting  that 
Turkey  treat  fairly  the  non-Moslem  elements  of  the  empire. 

France  and  Austria  also  attempted  to  prevent  any  ag- 
grandizement of  Russia  in  the  Balkans  and  Armenia,  and 
to  thwart  the  various  efforts  made  by  the  Muscovite  gov- 
ernment to  secure  special  privileges  within  the  Ottoman 
Empire.  Since  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century 
France  had  enjoyed  the  position  of  protectress  of  the  Catho- 
lics under  Turkish  rule,  and  had  been  able  to  use  the  rights 
granted  her  in  treaties  to  spread  the  French  language  in 
Turkey  through  the  schools  of  religious  orders.  The  cul- 
tural hold  of  France  on  the  Ottoman  Empire  promoted 
commerce,  and  the  French  government  was  suspicious  of 
the  rise  of  nationalism  among  the  Christians  of  Turkey, 
most  of  whom  belonged  to  the  Orthodox  Church.  Ruma- 
nians, Bulgarians,  Serbians,  Montenegrins,  Greeks,  and 
Christian  Arabs  professed  the  same  faith  as  the  Russians, 
while  most  of  the  Armenians  belonged  to  an  independent 
church  more  closely  affiliated  with  the  Orthodox  than  the 
Roman  communion.  The  triumph  of  nationalism  among 
the  Christians  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  therefore,  seemed 
bound  to  work  to  the  disadvantage  of  France  and  the  ad- 
vantage of  Russia. 

Austria's  interest  in  the  Ottoman  Empire  was,  like  the 
interest  of  Russia,  that  of  a  neighboring  state  which  hoped 
to  benefit  territorially  through  the  weakness  of  the  Turks, 
but,  if  that  were  impossible,  was  determined  that  the  other 
neighbor  should  not  profit.  The  Balkan  part  of  the  Eastern 
question  became  a  struggle  between  Russia  and  Austria  for 
political  control,  or,  if  that  could  not  be  achieved,  for  para- 
mount interest  in  the  Balkan  peninsula.  The  revolt  of  the 
Balkan  peoples  against  Turkey,  furthermore,  created  a 
unique  danger  for  Austria.  The  Hapsburg  empire  con- 
tained a  large  element  akin  in  blood  to  one  of  the  Balkan 
peoples  and  affiliated  with  them  in  language  and  history. 
In  the  duel  Russia  made  use  of  this  weapon  to  destroy  the 


98  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Hapsburg  empire.  Austria  attempted  to  minimize  the 
danger,  and  was  led  from  one  diplomatic  move  to  another 
until  she  finally  decided  to  stake  the  existence  of  the  empire 
in  an  effort  to  wrest  the  weapon  of  Serbian  nationalism 
from  Russia's  hands. 

The  Eastern  question  had  long  been  a  dominant  factor  in 
disturbing  international  relations  before  Italy  and  Ger- 
many completed  their  unification  and  became  great  powers. 
During  the  period  of  unification  in  Italy  Cavour  joined 
Great  Britain  and  France  in  the  Crimean  War  and  sent  an 
army  from  Piedmont  to  aid  the  western  powers  in  de- 
fending Turkey  from  Russia.  Cavour  wanted  to  gain  for 
Piedmont  the  right  of  representation  in  the  international 
conference  that  would  follow  the  war,  and  he  looked  for- 
ward to  an  alUance  with  France  against  Austria.  But  then, 
and  later,  the  Italians  realized  that  Russian  control  of  the 
Slavs  of  the  Balkans  would  be  scarcely  less  dangerous  to 
their  future  than  Austrian  control;  hence  they  followed 
the  policy  of  helping  neither  antagonist  against  the  other. 
Most  Italian  statesmen,  however,  have  shown  the  same 
disinclination  to  allow  Russia  to  become  a  Mediterranean 
power  as  have  British  and  French  statesmen.  Owing  to 
the  geographical  position  of  Italy,  also,  they  have  felt  that 
their  security  and  their  commercial  interests  were  best 
served  by  opposing  the  aspirations  of  the  Balkan  peoples, 
especially  those  of  Greece. 

The  entrance  of  Germany  into  Balkan  politics,  which 
occurred  during  the  period  under  survey  in  this  chapter, 
caused  a  metamorphosis  in  the  Near  Eastern  policies  of 
the  powers.  The  changes  in  diplomatic  combinations  were 
gradual,  and  in  some  measure  due  to  influences  and  the 
evolution  of  interests  that  had  little  to  do  with  the  Near 
East.  But  from  1878  to  1914  the  outstanding  new  factor 
in  the  Near  Eastern  question  was  Germany,  infeodating 
Austria  to  herself,  and  then  rapidly  and  thoroughly  pene- 
trating the  Balkan  peninsula  and  Asiatic  Turkey,  and  be- 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)    99 

coining  the  mistress,  politically  and  economically,  of  Con- 
stantinople, with  control  of  land  trade  routes  east  and  west. 
The  development  of  Germany's  Drang  nach  Osten  we  shall 
describe  elsewhere.^  What  we  need  to  bear  in  mind  here  is 
only  that  its  success  materially  strengthened  Austria-Hun- 
gary against  Eussia  and  led  Great  Britain,  France,  and 
Italy  to  abandon  the  old  opposition  to  Russia  on  the  ground 
that,  of  two  dangers  and  two  evils,  Russia  at  Constanti- 
nople was  the  lesser. 

The  two  Balkan  wars,  in  1912  and  1913,  are  commonly 
supposed  to  have  reopened  the  question  of  the  succession  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire,  and  to  have  substituted  Germany  for 
Great  Britain  as  defender  of  the  sultan's  dominions.  These 
wars,  however,  were  the  consequence  of  the  decisions  made 
at  the  Congress  of  Berlin.  For,  aside  from  Russia  (and 
possibly  Germany),  none  of  the  powers  realized  the  im- 
possibility of  putting  into  execution  the  treaty  of  Berlin, 
which  presupposed  what  did  not  and  could  not  happen: 
(1)  a  regenerated  Turkey,  developing  into  a  modern  Euro- 
pean state,  or,  failing  that,  a  neutralized  Turkey,  in  which 
no  powers  would  gain  advantages  over  the  others;  (2) 
adequate  protection  for  Christian  minorities,  assured  by 
the  joint  diplomatic  pressure  of  the  Berlin  signatories; 
and  (3)  complete  control  by  the  powers  over  the  relations 
of  the  Balkan  states  with  one  another  and  with  Turkey. 

On  the  eve  of  the  war  with  Russia  a  remarkably  astute 
ruler  ascended  the  throne  of  Turkey.  Sultan  Abdul  Hamid 
II  was  past  master  in  playing  the  game  of  world  politics. 
He  realized  that  the  powers  were  suspicious  of  one  another 
in  regard  to  every  proposal  for  the  solution  of  any  Near 
Eastern  problem,  because  their  rulers  and  statesmen  were 
thinking  of  foreign  policy  in  the  terms  of  making  invest- 
ments and  selling  goods.  He  knew  how  to  take  advantage 
of  the  constant  pressure  of  bankers  and  merchants  upon 
the  foreign  ministries  of  the  powers.    Therefore,  whenever 

'See  pp.  202-206. 


100  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

joint  action  was  threatened  he  played  each  power  in  turn 
against  the  others,  and  whenever  it  was  necessary  to  avert 
wrath  or  bid  for  support  he  frightened  or  cajoled  or  bribed 
the  powers  singly.  Sometimes  he  went  too  far,  but  even 
then  his  genius  made  capital  out  of  errors. 

With  a  view  to  giving  the  Beaconsfield  cabinet,  which 
was  supporting  him  against  Russia,  something  to  point  to 
in  answer  to  Gladstone's  denunciations  of  Turkey,  Abdul 
liamid,  a  few  months  after  his  accession,  gave  his  people  a 
constitution  which,  if  put  into  operation,  would  have 
brought  Turkey  into  the  family  of  European  nations.  When 
Beaconsfield  had  done  all  he  could  to  soften  for  Turkey 
the  terms  of  victorious  Russia,  and  had  been  paid  by  the  vir- 
tual cession  of  Cyprus,  the  sultan  blandly  suspended  the 
constitution,  and  sent  its  author,  Midhat  Pasha,  to  exile 
and  death.  From  this  time  on  until  the  Revolution  of  1908 
Abdul  Hamid  ruled  as  a  despot.  Foreigners  in  Turkey 
were  protected  from  most  of  the  injustices  of  arbitrary 
rule  and  enjoyed  security  of  life  and  property  because  of 
the  capitulary  regime.^  Ottoman  subjects,  on  the  other 
hand,  although  the  powers  had  reserved  in  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  the  right  of  joint  intervention  to  defend  them  against 
pillage   and   massacre,   were   unable   to   help   themselves 

* ' '  Capitulations  "  is  a  term  used  to  denote  the  special  privileges  granted  by 
treaty  to  foreigners  in  Oriental  countries.  Capitulations  originally  provided 
only  for  the  creation  of  legal  machinery  for  non-Moslems  of  foreign  origin 
resident  in  a  country  whose  laws  were  theocratic.  The  jurisprudence  of 
Mohammedan  lands  makes  no  provisions  for  non-Moslems.  In  the  Ottoman 
Empire  the  early  sultans  solved  this  problem  by  recognizing  their  Christian 
and  Jewish  subjects  as  separate  nations  {millets),  and  by  granting  their 
hierarchies  the  authority  to  exercise  administrative  and  judicial  control  in 
matters  affecting  their  own  peoples  which  Mohammedan  jurisprudence  did  not 
cover.  Europeans,  having  no  religious  courts  in  the  empire  (because  they 
were  of  different  branches  of  the  Christian  religion),  were  allowed  to  be 
under  the  jurisdiction  of  their  consuls  and  live  under  the  laws  of  their  coun- 
tries of  origin.  In  addition,  to  encourage  intercourse  with  Europe,  the  sultans 
allowed  foreign  traders  immunity  from  taxation.  This  extra-territoriality,  first 
conceived  of  as  a  convenience  and  granted  by  the  Turks  of  their  own  free 
will,  developed  in  the  nineteenth  century  into  a  means  of  putting  Turkey  under 
foreign  control.  The  capitulatory  regime,  in  the  era  of  world  politics,  has  been 
extended  to  other  Asiatic  countries.  The  Japanese  did  not  tolerate  it  long ;  but 
it  has  been  used  with  great  success  to  render  China  and  Siam  powerless  to 
resist  encroachments  upon  sovereignty. 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        101 

when  the  Turks  oppressed  them.  Only  Moslems  were  re- 
cruited for  the  army,  and  Christians  were  forbidden  the 
possession  of  firearms.  Only  Moslems  could  hope  for  jus- 
tice in  law-courts.  Having  neither  physical  nor  legal 
means  of  making  secure  life  and  property,  it  was  natural 
that,  when  the  constitution  was  suspended,  subject  Chris- 
tian (and  in  some  cases  non-Turkish  Moslem)  elements  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire  should  invoke  outside  aid  in  their 
distress. 

Concessions  and  trade  kept  the  powers  from  intervening 
effectively  to  make  living  conditions  tolerable  for  the  sub- 
ject peoples  of  the  empire.  This  was  a  violation  by  the 
signatories  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin  of  the  article  inserted 
to  meet  Russia's  argument,  that  revision  of  the  treaty  of 
San  Stefano  for  the  benefit  of  Turkey  was  handing  back 
several  million  defenseless  Christians  to  the  mercies  of 
the  Moslem  despot.  But  the  responsibility  of  the  Euro- 
pean statesmen  was  greater  than  simply  failure  to  live  up 
to  obligations.  Not  only  did  they  refuse  to  help  the  vic- 
tims of  Abdul  Hamid,  but  by  diplomatic  action  and  by  force 
they  attempted  to  thwart  the  efforts  made  by  the  Ottoman 
subject  peoples  to  rid  themselves  of  the  sultan's  tyranny, 
whether  by  insurrection  or  by  securing  the  cooperation  of 
their  more  fortunate  kinsmen  who  already  enjoyed  inde- 
pendence or  autonomy. 

After  the  treaty  of  Vienna  the  opposition  of  the  powers 
to  movements  for  independence  in  the  Balkans  could  be 
regarded  as  consistent  with  a  general  European  policy. 
Reactionary  continental  statesmen  feared  the  effect  of 
changes  in  political  institutions  or  in  the  territorial  status 
quo  because  nationalist  and  democratic  movements  any- 
where in  Europe  were  bound  to  have  a  repercussion  in  their 
own  countries.  Between  1815  and  1878  Europe  underwent 
profound  changes.  But  the  natural  fruition  of  nationalist 
movements  did  not  take  place  in  the  Balkans.  Political 
considerations  that  had  in  large  part  to  do  with  questions 


102         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

outside  the  Balkans  led  the  powers  to  interfere  in  the 
struggles  for  freedom  and  the  political  evolution  of  Otto- 
man subject  peoples.  Greece  was  created  without  Epirus, 
Thessaly,  and  the  larger  Greek  islands.  Moldavia  and 
Wallachia  were  forbidden  to  unite.  Serbian  and  Monte- 
negrin frontiers  were  drawn  arbitrarily  to  the  exclusion 
of  tens  of  thousands  of  kinsmen  left  under  Ottoman  rule, 
and  the  suzerainty  of  the  sultan  over  all  the  states  except 
Greece  was  insisted  upon.  By  defying  the  powers,  prog- 
ress in  statehood  was  gradually  made.  But  each  inde- 
pendent action  on  the  part  of  the  Balkan  peoples  precipi- 
tated an  international  crisis. 

At  the  congresses  of  Paris  and  Berlin  the  representatives 
of  the  Balkan  peoples  were  excluded  from  the  deliberations, 
and  the  treaties  were  written  without  considering  the 
wishes  or  interests  of  Greeks,  Serbians,  Rumanians,  Mon- 
tenegrins, Bulgarians,  and  Albanians.  What  advantages 
they  received  in  these  treaties  were  for  the  most  part 
merely  the  recognition  by  the  powers  of  accomplished 
facts.  During  the  generation  that  followed  the  Congress 
of  Berlin  the  liberated  portions  of  Balkan  peoples  were 
constantly  at  loggerheads  with  Turkey  and  with  one  an- 
other over  the  misrule  in  and  the  eventual  inheritance  of 
the  wide  band  of  territory  from  the  Black  Sea  to  the  Adri- 
atic, which  had  been  left  without  conditions  to  the  sul- 
tan. Greece  had  an  additional  cause  for  unrest  and  quarrel 
in  Ottoman  treatment  of  the  Cretans,  who  had  begged  at 
Berlin  to  be  incorporated  into  Greece.  No  less  after  the 
treaty  of  Berlin  than  before  were  the  Balkans  a  seething 
volcano,  ready  to  break  out  into  a  war  that  would  involve 
Europe. 

One  of  the  principal  reasons  for  the  intervention  of  Great 
Britain  to  revise  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano  had  been  the 
fear  that  Russia  would  control  the  new  state  of  Bulgaria, 
which  was  created  by  that  treaty  with  generous  frontiers, 
including  most  of  Macedonia  and  extending  to  the  ^gean 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        103 

Sea.  While  the  treaty  of  Berlin  at  last  recognized  the  inde- 
pendence of  Montenegro  and  Serbia  and  the  union  of  Mol- 
davia and  "VVallachia  in  the  independent  state  of  Rumania, 
Bulgaria  was  granted  only  autonomy  and  was  given  fron- 
tiers that,  like  those  of  Greece,  excluded  a  large  part  of 
the  Bulgarian  population  of  European  Turkey.  And,  in 
order  to  make  Bulgaria  still  weaker,  the  territory  granted 
autonomy  was  divided  into  two  separate  provinces,  as  had 
been  done  in  Rumania's  case  by  the  treaty  of  Paris.  But, 
just  as  the  Rumanians  disregarded  the  treaty  of  Paris  and 
proclaimed  Moldavia  and  Wallachia  one  state,  the  Bulgari- 
ans waited  only  seven  years  after  the  treaty  of  Berlin 
was  signed  to  confront  the  powers  with  the  fait  accompli 
of  the  union  of  Eastern  Rumelia  with  Bulgaria. 

During  these  seven  years,  however,  the  shoe  had  shifted 
to  the  other  foot.  What  Great  Britain  had  expected  had 
not  happened.  The  Bulgarians,  displaying  a  remarkable 
aptitude  for  government  and  a  spirit  of  independence  from 
foreign  control,  refused  to  make  their  country  a  vassal 
of  Russia.  Accordingly,  seeing  in  Bulgaria  not  an  outpost 
of  Russia  but  a  barrier  against  Russian  penetration  of  the 
Balkans,  the  British  did  not  disapprove  of  this  defiance  of 
the  treaty  of  Berlin.  On  the  other  hand,  Russia,  having 
found  that  she  could  not  control  Bulgaria,  opposed  the 
union  of  Eastern  Rumelia  with  Bulgaria.  And  thus  the 
two  powers  quite  reversed  their  attitude  upon  a  question 
over  which  they  had  nearly  fought  only  a  few  years  before. 

Russia  now  urged  the  sultan  to  send  an  army  into  Bul- 
garia. Abdul  Hamid  hesitated.  The  Gladstone  ministry 
had  just  fallen,  but  advices  from  London  indicated  that 
Gladstone,  who  was  committed  to  the  policy  of  mthdrawal 
from  Egypt,  would  be  returned  to  power  provided  he  was 
not  handicapped  with  the  problem  of  Turkey  disturbing  the 
peace.  Abdul  Hamid  felt  also  that  it  was  poor  policy  for 
Turkey  to  follow  Russian  advice  and  be  identified  with  a 
Russian  point  of  view,  especially  in  the  matter  of  a  coun- 


104         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

try  that  he  knew  was  lost  to  Turkey.  Serbia,  misinformed 
as  to  Turkey's  intentions,  declared  war  on  Bulgaria.  The 
Serb  invasion,  however,  was  quickly  met  and  driven  back 
by  the  Bulgarians,  who  in  turn  invaded  Serbia.  Finally 
Austrian  intervention  saved  Serbia;  and  peace  was  re- 
stored by  the  sultan's  agreement  to  recognize  Prince  Alex- 
ander of  Bulgaria  as  governor-general  of  Eastern  Rumelia. 

Russia  made  one  more  effort  to  control  Bulgaria.  A 
conspiracy  was  organized  against  Prince  Alexander,  who 
was  overthrown  and  compelled  to  abdicate.  Through  the 
efforts  of  the  prime  minister,  Stambuloff,  however,  Russian 
influence  was  successfully  resisted,  and  an  Austrian  officer. 
Prince  Ferdinand  of  Saxe-Coburg-Gotha,  grandson  of 
Louis  Philippe  of  France  and  closely  allied  to  the  British 
royal  family,  was  chosen  as  ruler.  For  more  than  twenty 
years  parties  hostile  and  friendly  to  Russia  alternately 
dominated  Bulgarian  political  life.  But,  although  the 
Russian  party  was  in  power  at  different  times  (once 
through  the  assassination  of  Stambuloff),  Russia  never  suc- 
ceeded in  using  Bulgaria  to  further  her  schemes  against 
Austria  and  Turkey.  Hence  Russia  turned  to  Serbia  and 
encouraged  the  Serbians  to  hope  for  territorial  aggrandize- 
ment at  the  expense  of 'the  Hapsburg  and  Ottoman  empires. 
This  policy  made  Serbia  and  Bulgaria  deadly  enemies; 
for  they  both  laid  claim  to  the  major  portion  of  Macedonia 
and  worked  against  each  other  to  obtain  the  succession  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire  in  Europe.  Under  Prince  Ferdinand, 
Bulgaria  became  a  prosperous  country  and  developed  a 
strong  army.  In  1908,  taking  advantage  of  the  revolution 
in  Turkey,  Ferdinand  proclaimed  the  independence  of  Bul- 
garia, and  was  crowned  czar  at  Tirnovo. 

The  treaty  of  Berlin  gave  to  Austria  the  administration 
of  the  Ottoman  provinces  of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina  and 
the  military  occupation  of  the  Sanjak  of  Novibazar.  These 
territories  were  in  the  northwestern  corner  of  the  Balkan 
peninsula,  south  of  Croatia  and  separated  from  the  Adri- 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        105 

atic  by  the  narrow  strip  of  the  Dalmatian  coast.  Like  the 
Croatians  and  Dalmatians,  the  Bosnians  and  Herzego- 
vinians,  although  partly  Mohammedan,  spoke  the  Serbian 
language  and  were  an  essential  part  of  the  Greater  Serbia 
that  was  the  goal  of  the  Serbian  nationalists.  Their  attri- 
bution by  the  powers  to  Austria-Hungary  was  a  severe 
blow,  which  time  only  aggravated.  Eussian  agents  fanned 
the  flames  of  discontent  and  used  the  decision  of  Berlin 
to  demonstrate  to  the  Serbians  the  necessity  of  an  inten- 
sive propaganda  in  Macedonia,  which  had  now  become  for 
Serbia  the  path  to  the  sea. 

In  1908  Austria-Hungary,  believing  that  the  Young 
Turk  Revolution  would  jeopardize  her  hold  on  Bosnia  and 
Herzegovina,  notified  the  other  signatories  of  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  of  the  annexation  to  the  Hapsburg  empire  of  Bos- 
nia and  Herzegovina.  Between  1885  and  1903  Serbia  was 
cursed  with  dynastic  conspiracies  and  scandals,  which  cul- 
minated in  the  assassination  of  the  king  and  queen  and  the 
return  to  the  throne  of  the  rival  dynasty  in  the  person  of 
King  Peter  Karageorgevich.  It  is  profitless  to  go  into  this 
disgraceful  history  other  than  to  mention  that  Austrian 
and  Russian  diplomacy  utilized  the  peripetia  of  the  court 
drama  to  influence  Serbian  foreign  and  economic  policies. 
After  the  double  assassination,  only  Russia  and  Austria- 
Hungary  recognized  the  new  king.  A  year  later  France, 
Germany,  and  Italy  sent  back  their  ministers  to  Belgrade. 
Great  Britain,  however,  refused  to  resume  diplomatic  rela- 
tions w^th  Serbia  until  1906. 

The  San  Stefano  treaty  gave  Greece  nothing,  and  in- 
cluded within  the  proposed  frontiers  of  Bulgaria  large  por- 
tions of  Macedonia  in  which  the  Greeks  claimed  to  have  a 
substantial  majority  of  the  population.  At  Berlin  the 
Greeks  fared  better  than  the  other  Balkan  nations ;  a  recti- 
fication of  frontier  was  promised  them,  which,  had  it  been 
made  in  accordance  with  the  definite  assurances  given  by 
Lord  Salisbury,  would  have  righted  the  wrong  done  the 


106         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Greeks  of  the  mainland  half  a  century  earlier  in  the  set- 
tlement after  the  war  of  independence.  Turks  and  Greeks 
appointed  a  joint  commission,  as  the  treaty  provided;  but 
Abdul  Hamid  scored  his  first  diplomatic  victory  in  a  long 
series  of  successful  evasions  of  obligations.  Although  the 
commission  had  meetings  on  the  ground  and  in  Constanti- 
nople, the  Turks  refused  to  consider  ethnographic  and  geo- 
graphic facts.  The  Greeks  appealed  to  the  powers,  who 
referred  the  question  for  settlement  to  their  ambassadors 
at  Constantinople.  Virtually  the  same  line  from  the 
JEigeaii  to  the  Adriatic  that  had  been  suggested  two  years 
earlier  at  Berlin  was  decided  upon.  Abdul  Hamid,  rely- 
ing for  support  upon  Austria-Hungary  and  Italy,  declared 
that  Turkey  could  not  acquiesce  in  the  loss  of  Epirus 
and  Thessaly.  Secretly,  however,  the  sultan  intimated  that 
he  would  yield  most  of  the  Greek  claims  in  Thessaly  if 
Epirus  remained  Turkish.  This  suited  the  two  great  pow- 
ers bordering  on  the  Adriatic  whose  strategic  interests 
were  in  conflict  with  the  proposal  to  extend  northward  the 
coast-line  of  a  state  already  in  possession  of  the  Ionian 
Islands  and  suspected  of  being  infeodated  to  British  for- 
eign'poUcy. 

Although  the  Greeks  mobilized  their  army,  the  boundary 
dispute  did  not  end  in  war.  A  compromise  was  effected  by 
an  international  commission  that  gave  Greece  most  of 
Thessaly  and  left  to  Turkey  most  of  Epirus.  Thus  were 
planted  the  seeds  of  one  of  the  most  troublesome  boundary 
questions  of  the  Balkans,  which  for  thirty  years  made  bad 
blood  between  Turkey  and  Greece  and  since  1912  has  em- 
bittered the  relations  between  Greece  and  Albania.  From 
the  point  of  view  of  the  wishes  and  interests  of  the  peoples 
concerned,  the  Epirotes  had  the  same  right  to  be  united  with 
Greece  as  the  Thessalians.  They  were  sacrificed  to  world 
politics,  and  have  given  the  powers  that  sacrificed  them 
trouble  ever  since. 

The  increase  of  Greek  territory  by  fourteen  thousand 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        107 

square  miles  and  of  the  independent  Greek  population  by 
three  hundred  thousand  was,  however,  a  notable  victory  for 
Hellenism,  and  it  added  to  the  little  kingdom  sorely  needed 
agricultural  lands.  On  the  other  hand,  the  maritime 
Greeks,  like  the  Epirotes,  failed  as  completely  as  in  former 
international  conferences  to  realize  their  ambitions.  The 
Greeks  of  the  mainland  were  hopelessly  intermingled  with 
Moslem  and  rival  Christian  elements  in  the  territories  to 
which  they  laid  claim.  But  in  the  islands  they  possessed 
an  overwhelming  majority.  From  Mitylene  to  Rhodes, 
the  islands  off  the  coast  of  Asia  Minor  (with  the  exception 
of  Samos,  which  had  enjoyed  autonomy  since  1835)  were 
given  no  privileged  status  in  the  Ottoman  Empire.  When 
Cretans  tried  to  plead  their  cause  at  Berlin,  they  were  not 
listened  to.  The  Cypriotes  were  transferred  from  Turkey 
to  Great  Britain  without  being  consulted.  They  knew 
nothing  of  the  diplomatic  deal  of  which  they  were  the  ob- 
ject until  English  soldiers  arrived  to  take  possession  of 
the  island. 

Aside  from  Thessaly,  Greece  gained  one  advantage  from 
the  revision  of  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano  from  which  later 
she  was  to  benefit  far  beyond  the  dreams  of  the  most  ardent 
pan-Hellenists:  Macedonia  was  prevented  from  becoming 
an  organic  part  of  Bulgaria.  By  the  creation  of  a  Slav 
state  extending  from  the  Balkans  to  the  -^gean,  Russian 
statesmen  wanted  to  make  sure  of  a  permanent  barrier  to 
shut  off  the  Greeks  from  Thrace  and  Constantinople.  The 
history  of  the  Balkan  States  since  their  emancipation  shows 
that  they  know  how  to  rid  themselves  of  troublesome  mi- 
norities. Had  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano  been  executed, 
Hellenism  would  have  largely  disappeared  froin  Mace- 
donia, except,  perhaps,  in  two  or  three  coast  cities.  When 
the  powers  placed  Macedonia  back  again  under  the  Turks, 
all  the  Christian  elements  were  condemned  to  another  gen- 
eration of  misrule.  But  the  Greek  element  at  least  could 
still  cherish  the  hope,  which  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano  would 


108         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

have  destroyed,  of  Macedonia's  inclusion  in  a  new  Byzan- 
tine Empire. 

Because  of  conflicting  aims  in  Macedonia,  the  emanci- 
pated Balkan  peoples,  who  had  previously  used  all  their 
strength  against  the  common  Mohammedan  oppressor, 
added  as  a  dominant  influence  in  foreign  policy  hatred  of 
one  another  to  hatred  of  the  Turks.  If  the  Turks  were  to  lose 
what  was  left  of  their  dominions  in  Europe,  each  Balkan 
state  determined  to  have  the  Uon's  share.  In  justification 
of  their  claims  to  Macedonia,  Greece,  Serbia,  and  Bulgaria 
adduced  the  same  arguments — possession  in  the  past,  eco- 
nomic and  strategic  necessity,  and  a  majority  in  the  popula- 
tion. A  balance-of-power  theory  was  developed  in  Balkan 
diplomacy,  and  each  little  state  became  insanely  jealous  of 
an  increase  of  the  territory  of  any  other.  We  have  seen  how 
Serbia,  after  the  proclamation  of  the  union  of  Eastern  Ru- 
melia  with  Bulgaria,  attacked  Bulgaria.  Greece  also  was 
eager  to  march  against  Bulgaria ;  but,  as  she  had  no  com- 
mon frontier  with  Serbia  or  Bulgaria,  the  Greeks  could  not 
get  at  the  Bulgarians  ^\ithout  invading  Turkish  territory. 

Until  the  end  of  his  reign  Abdul  Hamid  exploited  the 
consequences  of  the  Serbo-Bulgarian  War  by  encouraging 
the  bitter  rivalry  of  Serbians,  Bulgarians,  and  Greeks  in 
Macedonia.  Over  Epirus  bad  blood  existed  between  Greeks 
and  Albanians.  In  the  northern  and  northeastern  parts  of 
Albania  Turkish  officials  managed  to  keep  Montenegrins, 
Serbians,  and  Albanians  at  one  another's  throats.  By 
granting  Rumania  the  right  to  establish  a  branch  of  her 
national  church  among  the  Kutzo-Wallachians  (a  small 
but  scattered  mountaineer  element  in  Macedonia  which 
spoke  a  Rumanian  dialect),  all  the  Balkan  states  were  now 
brought  into  the  cockpit.  European  Turkey  touched  the 
Adriatic,  the  ^gean,  the  Sea  of  Marmora,  and  the  Black 
Sea;  separated  Greece  from  the  other  Balkan  states;  had 
a  common  frontier  ^^ith  Austria  and  Hungary  and  coasts 
only  twelve  hours  by  sea  from  Italy  and  Russia;   and 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        109 

the  railroad  to  Constantinople  was  an  essential  link  in 
Germany's  communications  ^^ith  the  Orient.  With  seven 
distinct  elements  of  the  population  pitted  against  one  an- 
other, A\ithin  twenty  years  of  the  signing  of  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  European  Turkey  had  fallen  into  a  state  of  anarchy. 

In  these  troubled  waters  Russia  and  Austria-Hungary 
fished.  Macedonia  was  called  "the  danger  zone  of  Europe" 
and  its  sovereign  "the  sick  man  of  Europe."  But  when 
Greece  went  to  war  with  Turkey  over  the  Cretan  question, 
the  powers  were  not  yet  grouped  into  alliances  that  would 
make  a  European  war  inevitable.  They  were  able  to  inter- 
vene jointly  to  save  Greece  after  her  defeat  without  getting 
into  difficulties  with  one  another.  Common  pressure  was 
exercised  on  Bulgaria  and  Serbia.  Despite  the  activity  of 
its  agents,  who  played  the  principal  part  in  the  Serbian 
propaganda  in  Macedonia,  the  Russian  government  advised 
the  Serbian  government  to  remain  on  friendly  terms  with 
Austria-Hungary,  Bulgaria,  and  Turkey.  The  Russian  ef- 
forts seemed  to  be  directed  particularly  to  advancing  the 
Serbian  propaganda  in  Macedonia  at  the  expense  of  the 
Greeks. 

Betw^een  1898  and  1902  the  situation  in  Macedonia  be- 
came intolerable.  Russia  was  not  in  a  position  to  make 
a  bid  for  exclusive  control  of  Macedonia,  either  by  negotia- 
tions mth  Turkey  or  through  Serbia  and  Bulgaria.  She 
felt  that  Great  Britain  was  watching  for  an  opportunity 
to  attack  her,  and  her  expansion  in  the  Far  East  demanded 
all  her  attention  and  energies.  She  therefore  joined  with 
Austria  in  an  ultimatum  to  Turkey.  A  memorandum  of 
reforms  that  the  two  powers  had  had  under  consideration 
ever  since  1897  was  presented  to  the  sultan  in  February, 
1903.  But  Abdul  Hamid  replied  that  he  had  already 
begun  to  apply  a  similar  program;  and  then  engineered  a 
series  of  insurrections  to  demonstrate  the  necessity  of 
keeping  large  armed  forces  in  Macedonia.  Public  opinion 
in  Europe  was  fooled,  and  Abdul  Hamid  put  down  the  in- 


110         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

surrections  with  great  cruelty.  Russia  and  Austria-Hun- 
gary, however,  persisted,  and  on  October  9,  1903,  they  told 
the  sultan  that  he  must  agree  to  what  is  known  as  the  Miirz- 
steg  program  of  reforms,  which  were  to  be  put  into  effect 
under  the  supervision  of  agents  of  the  two  powers  and 
enforced  by  a  reorganized  gendarmerie  commanded  by  an 
Italian  officer.  The  reforms  proved  a  farce.  But  the 
powers  did  not  come  to  a  parting  of  the  ways  in  regard  to 
Macedonia  until  after  the  defeat  of  Russia  in  the  Far  East. 
Then  Russia,  having  settled  her  differences  with  Great 
Britain,  turned  her  activities  once  more  to  the  Balkan  pen- 
insula and  threatened  to  disturb  the  plans  Germany  had 
been  making  to  bring  the  Ottoman  Empire,  in  its  entirety, 
into  her  economic  sphere  of  influence. 

Of  the  six  powers,  Germany  was  the  one  that  figured  least 
in  international  rivalry  over  the  succession  of  Turkey,  in 
concerted  diplomatic  and  naval  actions  to  coerce  Turkey, 
and  in  frontier  and  treaty  disputes  with  Turkey.  Russia 
and  Austria-Hungary  were  leaders  in  the  Balkan  interven- 
tion; Russia,  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  were  in- 
volved in  the  long-drawn-out  Cretan  question;  Russia, 
Great  Britain,  and  France  were  the  "protecting  powers" 
of  Greece ;  Great  Britain  and  France  intervened  in  EgjT)t ; 
Russia  made  diplomatic  representations  in  favor  of  Serbia, 
of  Bulgaria  (at  times),  and  of  the  Armenians;  France  was 
defender  of  the  interests  of  the  Catholics  of  the  empire, 
and  public  opinion  in  England  forced  Great  Britain  to  take 
a  stand  more  than  once  in  behalf  of  the  Armenians ;  Great 
Britain  detached  from  the  Ottoman  Empire  C5T)rus  and 
EgjTDt,  and  Russia  a  part  of  Armenia;  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  Italy  had  frequent  disputes  with  Constanti- 
nople over  frontier  questions  in  Arabia,  the  Red  Sea,  and 
the  Sudan.  When  Abdul  Hamid  was  compelled  to  accept 
foreign  control  over  a  portion  of  the  revenues  of  the  state, 
by  the  creation  of  the  Ottoman  public  debt.  Great  Britain 
and  France  were  the  principal  powers  interested.    We  have 


THE  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION  (1879-1908)        111 

traced  the  development  of  German  influence  in  Turkey 
elsewhere.^  But,  in  view  of  the  later  triumph  of  German 
diplomacy  at  Constantinople,  it  is  interesting  to  point  out 
that  Germany,  in  her  dealings  with  Abdul  Hamid,  profited 
by  the  fact  that  her  general  foreign  policy  did  not  cause 
constant  friction  with  Turkey — a  handicap  that  the  other 
powers  suffered. 

In  dealing  with  the  powers  Abdul  Hamid  took  full  ad- 
vantage of  the  various  conflicting  interests  in  their  world 
politics,  which  prevented  them  from  combining  to  dictate 
how  he  should  run  his  empire.  The  powers  drew  up 
definite  programs  of  reforms,  upon  the  adoption  of  which 
they  insisted  in  joint  notes;  together  and  singly,  they 
warned  Abdul  Hamid  to  keep  order  in  Macedonia,  to  stop 
bullying  the  Cretans,  and  to  refrain  from  massacring  the 
the  Armenians.  But  only  when  an  international  financial 
interest  was  at  stake  were  their  ultimatums  and  naval 
demonstrations  effective.  Abdul  Hamid  could  not  afford 
to  offend  the  bankers.  To  withstand  political  and  humani- 
tarian demands,  however,  he  was  in  a  splendid  position. 
It  was  not  until  the  closing  years  of  his  reign  that  Great 
Britain  compounded  her  colonial  rivalries  with  France  and 
Russia.  But  even  after  the  Anglo-French  agreement  of 
1904  and  the  Anglo-Russian  agreement  of  1907,^  and  after 
the  disappearance  of  Abdul  Hamid  from  the  scene,  British 
statesmen  hesitated  to  use  force  against  Turkey,  whose 
sultan  was  the  khalif  (successor  of  the  Prophet),  to  whom 
seventy  million  Mohammedans  of  India  owed  spiritual  al- 
legiance. 

We  can  not  enter  into  the  Cretan  question,  which  involved 
four  of  the  powers  with  Turkey  and  Greece  during  most 
of  the  period  under  survey ;  nor  into  the  Armenian  question. 
The  failure  of  European  diplomacy  to  reconcile  Ottoman 
and  Greek  interests  in  Crete  with  the  aspirations  of  the 

'■See  pp.  202-206. 

Tor  the  former  agreement  see  pp.  191-194,  and  for  the  latter  pp.  180-182. 


112         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Cretans,  and  to  prevent  the  wholesale  massacre  of  Ar- 
menians in  Asia  Minor  and  Constantinople,  demonstrated 
the  inability  of  the  powers  to  act  in  concert  for  the  solution 
of  the  Near  Eastern  question,  and  the  impotence  of  hu- 
manitarian considerations,  however  great,  to  influence  the 
course  of  world  politics.  Because  Armenia's  natural 
wealth  and  geographical  position  are  not  important  enough 
to  be  vital  factors  in  international  diplomacy,  statesmen 
have  given  attention  to  the  Armenians  only  during  the 
brief  periods  when  public  opinion  has  been  aroused  by  the 
stories  of  atrocities.  When  indignation  died  dovm  the  Ar- 
menians were  ignored.  The  Cretan  trouble  did  not  bring 
the  powers  into  conflict.  Its  bearing  on  world  poUtics  is 
limited  to  the  influence  it  had  upon  Greece's  role  in  ex- 
pelling Turkey  from  her  European  provinces. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

EITSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1829-1878) 

FROM  the  beginning  of  the  formation  of  the  Russian 
Empire  the  Muscovite  government  made  no  distinc- 
tion between  Europe  and  Asia.  There  was  simultaneous 
expansion  in  all  directions  towards  the  open  sea.  Conse- 
quently, the  additions  to  the  empire  were  always  in  con- 
tiguous territory.  Up  to  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, Russian  expansion  was  not,  strictly  speaking,  colonial, 
but  was  rather  the  natural,  automatic  development  of  a 
unitary,  poUtical  empire.  The  Russians  did  not  assimilate 
other  peoples  when  they  incorporated  them.  They  were 
not  feeling  the  urge  of  emigrating  to  escape  overpopula- 
tion, or  of  developing  new  lands  and  exploiting  alien 
peoples  to  secure  raw  materials  or  to  provide  markets  for 
their  surplus  production.  In  order  to  understand  the  radi- 
cal difference  between  Russia  as  a  world  power  and  the 
other  world  powers,  we  must  bear  these  facts  in  mind. 

The  treaty  of  Paris,  in  1856,  sought  to  impose  upon  Rus- 
sia conditions  that,  if  persisted  in,  would  have  prevented 
her  normal  economic  evolution.  Russian  foreign  policy  had 
to  adapt  itself  to  the  rules  of  the  new  game  of  world  politics. 
But  the  Muscovite  government  enjoyed  advantages  that 
enabled  it  to  play  a  more  independent  role  than  the  other 
powers  in  international  relations.  The  empire  was  self- 
supporting,  virtually  immune  from  invasion,  and  not  vitally 
affected  by  sea  power ;  and  its  rulers  did  not  have  to  take 
into  consideration  the  pressure  of  public  opinion. 

In  the  Near  East  and  the  Far  East  alike,  the  position 
of  Russia  was  different  from  that  of  other  European 
powers.     The  Balkans,  Turkey,  China,  and  Japan  were 

113 


114         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

neighbors.  Long  before  there  was  a  Near  Eastern  ques- 
tion, or  a  Far  Eastern  question,  to  disturb  the  relations 
among  the  European  powers  and  change  their  attitude 
toward  one  another,  the  Russians  had  been  building  up 
their  empire  at  the  expense  of  the  Turks  and  Persians, 
and  had  been  in  conflict  with  the  Chinese  and  Japanese 
over  commercial  and  strategic  problems.  These  did  not 
affect  the  Occidental  powers  until  the  new  conditions  in  in- 
dustry and  transportation  led  them  to  seek  far-off  markets. 

Siberia  was  an  integral  part  of  the  Muscovite  empire 
for  more  than  a  century  before  the  Russians  reached  the 
Black  Sea  or  were  firmly  established  on  the  Baltic.  The 
Cossacks  founded  Tobolsk  in  1587,  and  Muscovite  author- 
ity was  extended  beyond  Lake  Baikal  in  1640.  The  Rus- 
sians entered  the  basin  of  the  Amur  River  in  1650,  and 
signed  with  China  the  treaty  of  Nertchinsk,  fixing  the 
Russo-Chinese  boundary,  in  1689.  In  1492,  only  twelve 
years  after  control  in  Russia  passed  from  the  Tartars  to 
the  Russians,  Georgia  first  appealed  to  Moscow  for  assist- 
ance against  the  Persians  and  Turks. 

Five  years  before  the  French  Revolution  the  Crimea  was 
ceded  by  Turkey  to  Russia,  and  during  the  Napoleonic  era 
Russia  incorporated  Finland,  the  Aland  Islands,  Courland, 
and  Bessarabia.  Georgia  was  annexed  in  1801,  and  by  the 
treaty  of  Gulistan,  in  1813,  Persia  ceded  to  Russia  Cau- 
casian territories  that  had  been  contended  for  among  Per- 
sians, Turks,  and  Russians  for  several  generations. 

In  the  northern  Pacific  the  Russians  gained  their  first 
foothold  in  1636  and  arrived  at  the  mouth  of  the  Amur  in 
1644.  Behring  Strait  was  discovered  by  the  Cossack 
Dejneff  in  1648,  and  Russian  claims  were  established  over 
Kamchatka  and  Alaska  before  the  end  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  The  Russians  first  came  into  contact  with  the 
Japanese  in  the  Kurile  Islands ;  on  many  of  them  they  set 
up  pillars  of  occupation,  which  the  Japanese  promptly 


RUSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1829-1878)        115 

destroyed.  In  1807  Sakhalin  Island  was  occupied  by  the 
Eussian  navy.  Three  years  later  the  Russian  vice-admiral 
in  charge  of  the  expedition  to  explore  and  claim  the  Kurile 
Islands  was  made  prisoner  by  the  Japanese,  who  released 
him  in  1813  only  after  he  formally  renounced,  in  the  name 
of  his  government,  the  Russian  claim  to  Sakhalin  and  the 
Kurile  group. 

A  knowledge  of  these  facts  is  essential  to  the  study  of 
Russian  expansion  in  the  nineteenth  century.  We  need  to 
bear  in  mind  that  wars  with  Turkey  and  Persia  were  a 
natural  part  of  the  process  of  creating  the  Russian  Empire ; 
that  the  push  toward  the  sea  began  when  Russia  began; 
that  Siberia  was  not  an  acquisition  by  a  state  already 
formed,  but  an  original  and  component  part  of  it ;  and  that 
Russia  was  the  first  European  power  to  come  into  contact 
and  conflict  with  China  and  Japan.  After  steam  power 
changed  international  relations  other  European  states 
united  to  prevent  a  further  extension  of  Russia  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  and  to  enter  into  trade  rela- 
tions "with  China  and  Japan.  This  brought  Russia  into  op- 
position "with  other  European  powers  over  questions  that 
had  not  up  to  this  time  been  raised  in  European  affairs, 
questions  that  did  not  have  to  do  with  the  direct  relations 
between  Russia  and  the  Occidental  states,  questions  that 
Russia  felt  were  of  right  matters  to  be  decided  between 
her  and  her  Oriental  neighbors. 

In  the  Near  East  Russia  awakened  the  suspicions  and 
the  fears  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Austria  by  her 
sponsorship  of  the  cause  of  the  Christians  in  the  Balkans ; 
of  Great  Britain  and  France  by  her  desire  to  control  the 
Baltic  and  Black  seas ;  of  France  by  setting  up  a  claim  to 
protect  Orthodox  Christians  in  the  Ottoman  Empire,  which 
conflicted  in  Syria  and  Palestine  with  the  political  and  com- 
mercial advantages  enjoyed  by  France  through  being  pro- 
tector of  the  Catholic  Christians;  of  Austria  by  the  inten- 


116         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tion  attributed  to  Eiissia  of  reaching  the  Adriatic;  of 
Great  Britain  by  the  menace  to  India  arising  from  penetra- 
tion of  central  Asia. 

The  last  advance  Russia  was  able  to  make  in  the  Near 
East  without  interference  from  the  other  powers  was  in 
the  wars  with  Persia  and  Turkey  during  the  first  decade 
of  the  use  of  steam  power  in  transportation.  Complaints 
against  the  Russian  methods  of  administering  the  countries 
ceded  by  the  treaty  of  Gulistan  led  Persia  to  renew  the  war 
for  the  Caucasus  in  1826.  After  two  years  of  fighting, 
Persia  signed  the  peace  of  Turkmantchai,  abandoning  to 
Russia  the  provinces  of  Erivan  and  Nakhitchevan  and 
agreeing  to  pay  an  indemnity.  In  the  same  year  Russia 
turned  her  arms  against  Turkey,  crossed  the  Balkans,  and 
dictated  peace  in  Adrianople  in  the  spring  of  1829.  The 
treaty  of  Adrianople  was  a  fitting  complement  to  that  of 
Turkmantchai,  and  it  aroused  as  much  anxiety  in  Austria 
as  the  treaty  with  Persia  had  aroused  in  Great  Britain. 
Three  years  earlier,  by  the  convention  of  Akerman,  the 
Sublime  Porte  had  granted  the  Serbians  autonomy  and 
had  recognized  what  amounted  to  a  Russian  protectorate 
over  Serbia,  and  also  over  Wallachia  and  Moldavia.  These 
arrangements  were  now  specifically  confirmed.  Further, 
Turkey  assented  to  the  extension  of  Russian  sovereignty 
over  the  tribes  in  the  Caucasus  whose  allegiance  Persia 
had  renounced,  and  agreed  to  waive  all  her  own  claims. 

It  remained  for  Russia  to  make  the  inhabitants  of  the 
Caucasus  and  Transcaucasia  accept  her  sovereignty.  For 
thirty  years  she  was  never  without  a  war  on  her  hands 
somewhere  between  the  Caspian  and  the  Black  seas.  Not 
until  after  the  Crimean  War  did  she  push  the  pacification 
of  these  territories  with  such  vigor  that  the  resistance  of 
the  Mohammedan  tribes  was  broken.  Between  1859  and 
1864  her  administrative  control  was  definitely  established 
in  a  region  that  rapidly  became  one  of  the  richest  of  the 
empire.    Along  the  Caspian  coast  around  Baku  the  develop- 


RUSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1829-1878)        117 

ment  of  the  oil-fields  made  this  conquest  one  of  world-wide 
importance,  to  which  the  Occidental  powers  were  never 
reconciled.  Most  of  the  Circassians  emigrated  to  Turkey. 
At  Paris,  in  1856,  Russia  was  compelled  to  give  up  her 
expansion  southward  along  the  Black  Sea  and  her  demand 
for  Kars.  But  at  Berlin,  in  1878,  the  other  powers,  content 
with  blocking  her  in  the  Balkans,  agreed  to  the  annexation 
of  Kars,  Bayazid,  Ardahan,  and  Batum.  This  gave  Rus- 
sia a  strategic  frontier  against  Turkey,  and  a  port  and 
railway  terminus  on  the  Black  Sea,  which  the  development 
of  the  Baku  oil-fields  made  necessary. 

The  treaty  of  Paris  neutralized  the  Black  Sea  and  took 
away  from  Russia  the  mouth  of  the  Danube  by  depriving 
her  of  a  portion  of  Bessarabia,  together  mth  her  rights 
of  intervention  in  Serbia,  Moldavia,  and  Wallachia.  Four- 
teen years  later,  when  Russia  realized  that  the  balance  of 
power  in  Europe  was  changed  by  the  German  defeat  of 
France,  she  denounced,  on  October  31,  1870,  the  Paris 
stipulations  as  to  the  neutrality  of  the  Black  Sea.^  The 
treaty  of  Berlin  in  1878  recognized  this  act,  and  also  gave 
back  the  Bessarabian  territory  lost  after  the  Crimean 
War.  From  1878  until  1918,  when  the  Entente  gained 
control  of  the  Bosphorus,  Russia  maintained  a  fleet  in  the 
Black  Sea  and  strong  fortifications  on  the  littoral.  In 
1886  the  free  port  stipulation  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin  was 
repudiated. 

After  the  Crimean  War  the  Russians  began  to  expand 
into  central  Asia  from  the  north  by  way  of  the  steppes 
and  from  the  west  by  way  of  the  Caspian  Sea.  The  Trans- 
caspian  Province  was  built  up  largely  of  territory  taken 
from  Khiva,  and  it  brought  the  Russians  to  the  frontier  of 
Persia.     Farther    east,    Syr    Daria   was    detached    from 

*  Great  Britain  and  France  were  determined  also  to  render  Russia  powerless 
in  the  Baltic  Sea.  To  this  end,  the  treaty  of  Paris  provided  for  the  neutrali- 
zation of  the  Aland  Islands,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Gulf  of  Finland.  In  the 
autumn  of  1914  Russia  violated  this  provision  of  the  treaty  of  Paris  also,  and 
did  not  answer  the  protests  of  Sweden,  for  whose  benefit  the  original  stipula- 
tion was  supposed  to  have  been  made. 


118         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Bokhara  after  the  Holy  War  of  1866.  Tashkend  was  cap- 
tured in  1865,  and  Alexander  II  created  the  government  of 
Turkestan  in  1867.  This  brought  the  Russians  to  the  fron- 
tier of  Afghanistan,  and  was  the  beginning  of  a  new  source 
of  friction  between  Russians  and  British,  in  which  Persians 
and  Afghans  became  the  victims.  The  khan  of  Khiva  ac- 
knowledged the  supremacy  of  the  czar  in  1870,  and  Bokhara 
became  a  vassal  state  of  Russia  in  1873. 

The  intervention  of  Great  Britain  and  France  to  save 
Turkey  in  1854  and  the  attitude  of  Italians,  Germans,  and 
Austrians,  were  taken  to  heart  by  the  czar  and  his  minis- 
ters, who  realized  that  all  of  the  powers  stood  between  them 
and  the  Mediterranean.  The  decision  to  colonize  eastern 
Siberia,  where  up  to  this  time  only  convicts  had  been  sent, 
followed  immediately.  In  1855  began  the  new  movement 
of  Russian  colonization  to  the  Pacific  coast,  which  had  been 
renounced  in  the  Chinese  treaty  of  1689.  By  the  treaty  of 
Nertchinsk,  Russia  had  promised  China  to  abandon  her  ad- 
vance along  the  Amur.  Taking  advantage  of  the  embar- 
rassment of  China,  who  was  struggling  with  the  demands 
of  the  British  and  French,  Russia  now,  however,  disre-' 
garded  the  old  treaty  and  sent  peasants  all  along  the  river 
under  the  protection  of  Cossacks.  Great  progress  was 
made  between  1855  and  1858,  when  Russia  joined  Great 
Britain  and  France  in  forcing  China  to  sign  treaties  whose 
advantages  were  unilateral. 

But  we  must  go  back  to  the  decade  preceding  the  Cri- 
mean War  for  the  first  steps  in  the  renewal  of  Russian 
activity  in  the  Far  East.  The  treaty  of  Nanking  in  1842, 
following  the  Opium  War,  gave  Hong-Kong  to  Great 
Britain  and  opened  up  for  foreign  trade  four  treaty  ports 
besides  Canton.  The  United  States,  France,  Belgium,  Swe- 
den, and  Norway  secured  treaty  rights  between  1844  and 
1847;  while  an  imperial  rescript  of  December  28,  1844, 
permitted  the  propagation  of  Christianity,  which  had  been 
suppressed  in  1724.     These  encroachments  alarmed  and 


KUSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1829-1878)        119 

stimulated  the  Russian  government.  There  was  fear  that 
the  missionaries  and  traders  of  western  Europe  would 
quickly  appropriate  everything  in  sight,  and  this  appre- 
hension was  confirmed  by  the  cruises  of  British  and  French 
squadrons  in  north  Pacific  waters  for  several  years  before 
the  Crimean  War.  The  intervention  of  the  United  States 
and  the  western  European  powers  in  Japan  also  demanded 
attention.  In  the  interior  of  Asia,  Russia  was  the  neigh- 
bor of  China,  with  boundaries  settled  by  treaties  in  1689, 
1727, 1768,  and  1792.  These  regulated  the  traffic  across  the 
frontier  and  gave  certain  rights  to  the  Orthodox  Church. 
In  the  north  Pacific  up  to  this  time  only  the  Japanese  had 
staked  out  claims  rivaling  those  of  the  Russians. 

Russia 's  answer  to  the  treaty  of  Nanking  was  the  Kuldja 
convention,  concluded  in  1851  for  the  regulation  of  trade  on 
the  Mongolian  frontier — a  settlement  which  gave  Russia 
a  pretext  for  annexing  most  of  Kuldja  thirty  years  later. 
In  1851  also,  Nikolaevsk,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Amur,  was 
founded  and  fortified,  and  two  other  posts  on  the  sea-coast 
were  established  in  1853.  In  the  same  year  the  Russians 
put  garrisons  in  the  southern  part  of  Sakhalin  Island,  near 
one  of  which  coal  was  discovered. 

With  this  start,  they  were  ready  to  take  diplomatic  steps 
when  the  psychological  moment  should  arrive.  This  mo- 
ment came  with  the  Second  Anglo-Chinese  War.  China  had 
protested  against  the  violations  of  the  ancient  treaty  con- 
cerning the  Amur.  But  her  hands  were  tied  with  the  Tai- 
ping  Rebellion,  and  when  Great  Britain  and  France  again 
started  hostilities  in  1857  Russian  diplomats  were  able  to 
sympathize  with  China.  Had  Russia  not  also  been  the  vic- 
tim of  Anglo-French  aggression,  and  had  she  not  been 
forced  to  conclude  a  humiliating  treaty  the  previous  year? 
The  treaty  of  Aigun,  May  29,  1858,  recognized  the  north 
bank  of  the  Amur  to  the  sea  as  Russian,  and  gave  Russia 
the  reversion  of  rights — ahead  of  any  other  foreign  power 
— over  the  territory  between  the  Usuri  and  the  sea.    Two 


120         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

weeks  later  the  Eussians  were  the  first  signatories  of  the 
Tientsin  treaties,  which  the  British,  French,  and  Americans 
had  drafted  to  impose  upon  China  in  the  opening  up  of 
trade.  When  the  French  and  British  renewed  the  war  and 
marched  on  Peking,  the  Eussian  envoy,  who  had  stayed 
uith  the  Chinese,  became  the  mediator  for  China.  The 
British  and  French  were  dumfounded  when  they  discov- 
ered that  on  November  14,  1860,  three  weeks  after  they 
had  secured  new  treaties,  with  additional  advantages,  from 
China  at  the  point  of  the  sword,  and  after  a  costly  expedi- 
tion, a  Eusso-Chinese  treaty  gave  Eussia,  who  had  not 
fought  at  all,  the  rich  territory  of  Primorskaya,  between 
the  Usuri  Eiver  and  the  Pacific.  This  valuable  acquisition, 
which  became  the  maritime  province  of  Siberia,  contained 
a  great  harbor  that  had  been  discovered  and  named  by  the 
French  in  1852  and  renamed  and  partly  mapped  out  by  an 
English  squadron  in  1855.  The  Eussians  rebaptized  Vic- 
toria Bay.  It  became  Peter  the  Great  Bay,  and  in  1861 
Vladivostok  was  founded. 

The  Eussian  government  was  not  unmindful  of  the  neces- 
sity of  treating  with  Japan,  which  was  just  entering  into 
world  affairs.  A  Eusso-Japanese  treaty  was  signed  in  1856, 
dividing  the  Kurile  Islands  between  Eussia  and  Japan  and 
declaring  Sakhalin  neutral.  But  after  the  establishment  of 
Vladivostok  the  Eussians  became  worried  by  the  anomalous 
status  of  the  latter.  They  were  afraid  that  the  island 
would  be  occupied  by  another  European  power,  or  that 
Japan,  at  the  instigation  and  under  the  influence  of  some 
other  power,  would  disregard  the  treaty  provisions  of  1856 
and  fortify  the  island.  Accordingly  in  1862  Eussia  sug- 
gested to  Japan  the  joint  occupation  of  the  island,  but  de- 
manded the  lion's  share.  Japan's  counter-offer  to  divide 
was  not  accepted,  and  in  1865  Eussia  proposed  to  give  her 
share  of  the  Kurile  Islands  in  exchange  for  the  whole  of 
Sakhalin.  In  1867  a  curious  convention  was  signed  ac- 
knowledging the  common  right  of  occupation,  wherever  it 


RUSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION  (1829-1878)        121 

was  made  effective  by  colonization,  but  with  no  delimitation 
of  zones.  The  Russians,  not  having  sufficient  colonists, 
merely  staked  out  claims.  The  Japanese  followed  suit. 
This  unsatisfactory  arrangement  was  abandoned  in  1875, 
when  Japan  agreed  to  the  proposal  of  1865,  ceded  Sakhalin 
to  Russia,  and  took  in  exchange  the  remainder  of  the  Kurile 
Islands.  In  the  meantime  Russia  sold  her  rights  on  the 
American  coast  to  the  United  States  in  1867. 

Sakhalin  was  essential  for  the  freedom  and  protection 
of  the  new  port  of  Vladivostok.  But  Russia  recognized 
from  her  experience  in  the  Crimean  War  the  futility  of 
remote  island  and  overseas  possessions  for  a  nation  that 
could  not  hold  its  own  against  naval  powers.  Even  under 
the  new  conditions  of  world  politics,  the  colonial  expansion 
of  Russia  was  to  follow  the  old  policy  of  the  growth  of 
the  Russian  Empire — no  jumps,  but  simply  the  addition 
of  contiguous  territories.  The  political  foundations  were 
laid  before  1878.  It  required  only  railways  to  knit  together 
the  empire,  and  to  bring  into  touch,  with  and  under  the  ef- 
fective administrative  control  of  Petrograd  and  Moscow, 
an  easily  defended  empire  of  boundless  wealth. 


CHAPTER  IX 

CONSOLIDATION  OF  RUSSIAN  POWER  IN  THE  FAR  EAST 

(1879-1903) 

THE  dominions  of  the  Romanoffs  in  Europe  and  Asia 
grew  by  expansion  in  every  direction  from  Moscow. 
In  seeking  outlets  to  the  sea,  the  Russians  made  no  jumps ; 
hence  the  land  over  which  their  flag  waved  in  1914  was  all 
contiguous  territory.  They  added  neighboring  countries 
and  subjected  neighboring  races  until  they  were  masters 
of  the  largest  continuous  empire  the  world  has  ever  known. 
Their  political  aggrandizement  outward  from  Moscow  was 
a  consistent  forward  march  toward  the  Black  Sea,  the 
Baltic  Sea,  the  White  Sea,  the  Yellow  Sea,  the  Persian 
Gulf,  the  Adriatic  Sea,  the  ^gean  Sea,  and  the  Mediter- 
ranean Sea.  Before  the  World  War  the  first  three  of  the 
eight  possible  outlets  had  been  reached  and  made  secure. 
To  reach  the  others  Russian  foreign  policy  ran  afoul  of 
Italy  and  Austria-Hungary  in  the  Balkans,  of  all  the  great 
powers  in  the  Ottoman  Empire,  of  Great  Britain  in  Per- 
sia and  Afghanistan,  of  China  and  Japan  in  the  Far  East. 
Its  final  success  depended  upon  the  collapse  of  Turkey, 
the  limiting  of  Great  Britain's  influence  in  the  countries 
surrounding  India,  and  the  partition  of  China. 

Up  to  the  closing  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the 
efforts  of  Russia  were  directed  principally  against  the  in- 
tegrity of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  She  tried  to  become  the 
dominant  power  in  the  Balkans,  to  control  the  Bosphorus 
and  the  Dardanelles,  and  to  encroach  upon  Asiatic  Tur- 
key by  extending  her  empire  south  of  the  Caucasus.  Dis- 
tance made  political  and  economic  expansion  in  Asia  as  yet 
more  or  less  impracticable.    Russia  became  a  rival  with 

122 


RUSSIAN  POWER  IN  FAR  EAST   (1879-1903)  123 

whom  Great  Britain  had  to  reckon,  a  despoiler  of  China, 
and  an  enemy  of  Japan,  only  when  soldiers  and  colonists 
followed  the  extension  of  her  railroad  system.  When  the 
Russian  rail-heads  arrived  at  the  frontiers  of  Persia  and 
of  Afghanistan,  Great  Britain  prepared  to  tight.  When 
the  Trans-Siberian  Railroad  reached  the  Pacific,  war  be- 
tween Russia  and  Japan  was  ine\dtable. 

In  studying  the  expansion  of  Russia  across  Asia,  how- 
ever, we  need  to  have  before  us  a  meteorological  map  of  the 
continent.  The  Trans-Siberian  Railway  had  to  be  kept  as 
far  south  as  possible,  for  two  reasons:  to  avoid  cold  and 
snow,  enemies  of  steam  transportation;  and  to  traverse 
territories  whose  development  by  colonists  would  make 
the  construction  of  the  railroad  financially  practicable. 
It  was  considerations  of  climate,  also,  that,  once  the  project 
of  linking  the  Pacific  with  Moscow  was  adopted,  led  to  the 
policy  of  political  expansion  southward.  The  vast  stretches 
of  Siberia,  already  o^vned  by  Russia,  were  of  no  value  for 
the  railroad's  maintenance ;  to  make  the  project  pay,  branch 
lines  had  to  be  run  towards  Persia,  India,  and  China.  We 
must  not  fall  into  the  error  of  regarding  Russian  foreign 
policy  in  Asia,  after  the  conception  of  the  Trans-Siberian 
Railway,  as  simply  a  policy  of  intrigue  against  Great 
Britain  in  India  and  of  wanton  land-grabbing  in  China. 
The  commerce  of  Persia  and  Afghanistan,  of  Tibet  and 
Mongolia,  were  factors  of  importance ;  northern  Manchuria 
was  the  logical  route  to  Vladivostok ;  a  branch  south  from 
Mukden  to  Dalny  would  give  an  ice-free  terminal  port  and 
add  to  the  railroad 's  revenue ;  an  extension  to  Peking  would 
follow  of  itself. 

After  the  Congress  of  Berlin  the  Russians  were  unable 
to  realize  their  aspirations  in  the  Balkan  peninsula.  Con- 
stantinople had  eluded  their  grasp.  No  European  power, 
not  even  France,  was  ■\\dlling  to  support  Russia  in  an  ag- 
gressive Near  Eastern  policy.  After  the  disappointment 
of  failing  to  dominate,  politically  and  economically,  infant 


124         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Bulgaria,  Russian  statesmen  limited  their  efforts  to  check- 
mating any  extension  of  Austrian  influence  in  the  Balkans. 
They  were  glad  to  sign  an  agreement  -wdth  Austria-Hungary 
for  the  preservation  of  the  status  quo  in  the  Balkan  pen- 
insula, and  six  years  later  to  join  that  power  in  presenting 
the  Miirzsteg  program  to  the  signatories  of  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  as  a  means  of  solving  the  Macedonian  problem. 
This  enabled  them  to  concentrate  all  their  efforts  upon  ex- 
pansion in  Asia. 

AVhen  the  secret  treaty  of  Skiemevice  was  signed  in  1884, 
Czar  Alexander  III  refused  to  agree  to  the  suggestion  of 
Bismarck  that  the  stipulation  of  benevolent  neutrality 
should  hold  good  in  the  event  of  two  of  the  powers  in 
the  Dreikaiserbund  (league  of  three  emperors)  being  at 
war  with  a  power  outside  the  group.  Although  he  was 
willing  to  enter  into  the  treaty  with  a  view  to  protecting 
Russia  against  an  attack  by  the  Triple  Alliance,  he 
thought  that  it  was  not  to  the  interest  of  Russia  to  see 
France  crushed  again.  When  the  treaty  expired  in 
1887,  he  refused  to  renew  it.  France  was  thus  saved  from 
a  continuance  of  complete  isolation  by  Russia's  anxiety 
over  a  further  shifting  of  the  balance  of  power  in  Europe 
through  the  permanent  weakness  of  France.  He  did 
not  mean  to  encourage  France  in  an  aggressive  policy 
towards  Germany.  But  as  Russia  needed  French  financial 
support  for  her  railway  projects,  especially  in  Asia,  he 
agreed  to  reassure  France  to  the  extent  of  entering  into 
a  military  convention,  which  was  ratified  shortly  before 
his  death.  When  Nicholas  II  succeeded  to  the  throne  in 
November,  1894,  the  understanding  became  an  alliance. 
Nicholas  had  no  quarrel  with  Germany  and  did  not  intend 
to  be  drawn  into  one.  Nor  did  he  look  for  political  aid  from 
France  in  Russia's  Far  Eastern  pohcy.  But  he  did  have  to 
secure  French  capital  for  the  Trans-Siberian  Railway  and 
its  ramifications,  and  he  realized  that,  once  enormous  sums 


RUSSIAN  POWER  IN  FAR  EAST   (1879-1903)  135 

of  French  money  were  tied  up  in  Russian  schemes,  France 
would  not  join  other  powers  in  opposing  Russia,  even 
though  she  could  not  be  counted  upon  to  support  her. 

Between  1895  and  1905  the  railway  mileage  in  the  Rus- 
sian Empire  was  almost  doubled.  Considerably  more  than 
half  of  the  new  mileage  was  in  Asiatic  Russia.  Its  con- 
struction completely  changed  the  political  and  economic 
history  of  the  empire.  The  first  section  of  the  Trans-Si- 
berian Railway,  from  Chelyabinsk  to  Omsk,  was  opened  in 
December,  1895.  During  the  next  seven  years  all  the  con- 
necting Hnks  (except  around  Lake  Baikal)  were  completed 
and  a  number  of  branch  lines  built.  Vladivostok  was  joined 
to  Moscow  by  a  railway  line  five  thousand  miles  long,  a 
thousand  miles  of  which  were  in  Chinese  territory.  It  was 
originally  intended  to  build  the  Trans-Siberian  Railway 
entirely  on  Siberian  territory,  and  by  1898  the  rails  had 
been  pushed  five  hundred  miles  north  from  Vladivostok  to 
join  the  hne  coming  from  the  west.  But  the  cost,  in  view  of 
engineering  difficulties  and  the  impossibility  of  ever  count- 
ing upon  more  than  a  scant  population,  was  prohibitive. 
This  led  to  the  Manchurian  short  cut  and  the  war  mth 
Japan. 

"When  we  consider  how  essential  to  the  success  of  the 
Russian  railway  projects  was  the  right  of  way  across 
northern  Manchuria,  the  determination  of  Russia  not  to 
allow  Japan  to  remain  on  the  continent  after  her  victory 
over  China  is  understood.  Students  of  European  imperi- 
alism understand  also  the  chain  of  events  that  put  Russia 
in  the  place  from  which,  by  insisting  upon  the  modification 
of  the  treaty  of  Shimonoseki,  she  had  ousted  Japan.  Vladi- 
vostok and  the  thousand  miles  of  railway  in  China  had  to 
be  protected. 

It  would  not  do  to  allow  a  Japanese  naval  base  at 
Port  Arthur,  as  that  would  facihtate  landing  a  Japan- 
ese army;  ergo,  a  naval  base  must  be  estabhshed  where 


126         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  potential  enemy  wanted  one.  The  naval  base  must 
be  connected  with  the  railway  by  a  branch  line  for  use 
in  case  of  siege.  It  would  not  pay  to  build  the  line  for  stra- 
tegic purposes  alone;  ergo,  a  commercial  port  and  mining 
concessions  must  also  be  thought  of.  Additional  justifi- 
cation was  found  in  the  fact  that  Vladivostok  was  ice- 
bound (or  at  least  ice-impeded)  in  winter.  A  simple  right 
of  way  across  northern  Manchuria,  therefore,  easily  de- 
veloped into  successive  demands  at  Peking  for  Russian 
control  of  all  Manchuria,  including  the  Liao-tung  penin- 
sula. Once  committed  to  this  policy,  Russia  felt  that  she 
could  not  stop  with  Manchuria.  A  naval  base  in  Korea  be- 
came necessary. 

From  the  Russian  point  of  view,  every  move  seemed  a 
reasonable  corollary  to  necessary  railroad-building.  From 
the  Japanese  point  of  view,  however,  Russian  activity  was 
rapidly  creating  a  situation  in  which  Japan  would  either 
have  to  accept  the  exclusive  control  of  Russia  in  Man- 
churia (and  eventually  in  Korea),  protected  by  Russian 
naval  supremacy  in  Japan's  own  waters,  or  else  fight 
Russia. 

For  five  years  after  she,  with  the  help  of  France  and 
Germany,  robbed  Japan  of  the  fruits  of  the  Sino-Japanese 
"War,  Russia  made  her  advances  cautiously.  But  when  the 
Boxer  Rebellion  threw  China  into  anarchy,  her  full  plans 
began  to  come  to  light.  France,  Germany,  and  Great 
Britain  had  now  become  accomplices  in  the  spoliation  of 
China,  and  were  in  no  position  to  oppose  Russia  openly, 
either  at  Peking  or  by  direct  diplomatic  representations  at 
Petrograd.  The  United  States  would  go  no  farther  than 
words.  The  Chinese  government  was  corrupt  and  passive. 
Alone  Japan  faced  the  test  that  would  determine  whether 
she  was  to  become  a  great  power  or  a  vassal  state  like  the 
other  countries  of  Asia. 

Russian  statesmen  acted  imprudently.  Had  they  been 
content  to  restrict  Russian  activities  to  Manchuria,  they 


RUSSIAN  POWER  IN  FAR  EAST  (1879-1903)        127 

could  have  postponed,  if  not  averted,  the  conflict  with  Ja- 
pan. In  securing  the  long  lease  of  Port  Arthur  and  the  con- 
cession to  extend  a  branch  of  her  railroad  into  the  Liao- 
tung  peninsula,  Russia  was  not  menacing  Japan  more  than 
were  the  other  three  powers  who  were  partners  in  encroach- 
ing upon  Chinese  sovereignty.  Great  Britain,  for  one,  had 
signed  a  sphere-of -influence  agreement  with  Russia.  Ger- 
many was  acting  in  the  Shantung  peninsula  as  Russia  was 
acting  in  the  Liao-tung  peninsula.  France  was  now  the 
open  ally  of  Russia.  All  four  powers  had  leased  ports 
which,  in  their  hands,  were  a  menace  to  Japan.  Japan 
could  not  fight  all  the  powers,  and  her  diplomatic  position 
would  have  been  precarious  had  she  declared  war  on  Rus- 
sia for  what  was  happening  in  China.  It  was  common 
sense  for  the  Russians  to  wait  before  provoking  Japan 
until  they  had  completed  their  Asiatic  railroad,  system 
and  had  tested  it  for  military  purposes.  But,  instead 
of  making  haste  slowly,  they  tried  to  do  everything  at 
once. 

In  March,  1900,  occurred  the  first  of  the  events  that  com- 
pelled Japan  to  issue  her  second  challenge  to  Europe.^  It 
was  announced  that  Russia  had  secured  a  concession  for 
exclusive  settlement  at  Masan-pho,  the  finest  harbor  of 
Korea,  and  the  promise  of  the  Korean  government  not  to 
cede  the  island  of  Koji,  off  Masan-pho,  to  any  foreign 
country ;  and  the  Petrograd  government  forthwith  declared 
its  intention  to  make  Masan-pho  a  winter  harbor  for  war- 
ships. Had  Masan-pho  become  a  naval  base,  Russia  would 
have  dominated  the  passage  from  the  Japan  Sea  to  the 
Yellow  Sea.  Japan  sent  an  ultimatum  to  Korea,  demand- 
ing that  the  concession  be  canceled,  and  after  a  year  of 
bickering  the  matter  was  temporarily  settled  by  a  grant 
of  concessions  at  Masan-pho  to  both  Russia  and  Japan. 
At  the  same  time,  a  joint  Korean-Japanese  company  se- 
cured a  concession  for  a  railroad  from  Seoul  to  the  port  of 

»See  Chapter  XII. 


128         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Fusan,  which  is  near  Masan-pho,  and  which  the  Japanese 
knew  they  could  develop  in  such  a  way  as  to  control 
Masan-pho. 

The  second  attempt  of  Eussia  to  enter  Korea  occurred 
in  1903.  Inspired  by  the  example  of  France  in  Siam,  where 
a  lumber  concession  in  the  Mekong  Valley  was  being  suc- 
cessfully followed  up  by  administrative  control  of  both 
banks  of  the  river,  Eussia  established  a  settlement  at 
Phyong-an  Do,  on  the  Korean  side  of  the  Yalu  Eiver.  The 
Korean  government  protested.  The  Eussian  minister  re- 
plied that  a  settlement  at  Phyong-an  Do  was  necessary  for 
developing  a  timber  concession  granted  in  1896.  The 
Koreans  rejected  this  interpretation.  There  was  nothing 
in  the  terms  of  the  concession  about  a  settlement.  The  Eus- 
sian minister  then  tried  to  force  Korea  to  sign  supple- 
mentary clauses  to  the  original  concession,  legalizing  the 
occupation  of  land  at  Phyong-an  Do.  Seconded  by  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States,  Japan  backed  up  the  Korean 
protest. 

Here  the  fatal  weakness  of  the  Korean  government  be- 
came evident.  It  was  the  same  kind  of  weakness  that  was 
leading  to  the  partition  of  China.  Afraid  of  provoking 
resentment,  and  unwilling  to  take  either  side,  Korea  sought 
a  solution  in  inaction.  She  neither  insisted  upon  the  Eus- 
sians  leaving  nor  signed  the  supplementary  clauses.  To 
get  even  with  Japan,  Eussia  instigated  the  Korean  govern- 
ment to  protest  against  the  issue  of  notes  by  the  Japanese 
bank  at  Seoul,  the  first  and  only  banking  enterprise  in 
Korea.  The  Japanese  bank-notes  were  declared  illegal. 
No  steps  were  taken,  however,  to  prevent  their  circulation. 
None  could  accuse  the  Koreans  of  partiality.  Unable  to 
defend  their  own  interests,  and  unmlling  to  take  sides,  they 
simply  put  up  their  country  as  a  prize  to  be  fought  for  and 
won  by  the  strongest. 

Pushed  to  its  logical  conclusion,  Eussian  foreign  policy 


RUSSIAN  POWER  IN  FAR  EAST  (1879-1903)        129 

in  the  Far  East  led  from  Vladivostok  to  Korea  and  Liao- 
tung.  In  1894  Japan  fought  China  to  keep  Russia  out  of 
Korea,  and  as  a  result  of  her  victory  took  Liao-tung,  al- 
though she  was  not  allowed  to  keep  it.  In  1904  Japan 
fought  Russia  to  keep  Russia  out  of  Korea,  and  again  took 
Liao-tung.  Both  wars  were  caused  by  the  inability  of 
Korea  to  maintain  her  independence  and  of  China  to  main- 
tain her  sovereignty. 


CHAPTER  X 

JAPAN'S  riEST  CHALLENGE  TO  EUEOPE:  THE  WAR 
WITH  CHINA   (1894-1895) 

ACCIDENTALLY  discovered  by  the  Portuguese  about 
the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  century,  Japan  became  a 
field  for  missionary  propaganda,  and  during  almost  a  hun- 
dred years,  from  1542  to  1637,  had  trade  and  cultural  rela- 
tions with  Europe.  For  more  than  fifty  years  Portuguese 
Jesuits  and  traders  enjoyed  a  monopoly.  But  at  the  end 
of  the  sixteenth  century  the  Spanish  Franciscans,  operat- 
ing from  the  Philippines,  began  to  enter  the  field.  The 
eyes  of  the  Japanese  were  opened  as  to  the  significance 
of  the  propaganda  by  the  frank  statement  of  the  captain 
of  a  wrecked  Spanish  galleon,  who  thought  to  intimidate 
the  natives  when  he  declared : 

"Our  kings  begin  by  sending  into  the  countries  they  wish 
to  conquer  missionaries  who  induce  the  people  to  embrace 
our  religion,  and  when  they  have  made  suitable  progress, 
troops  are  sent  who  combine  with  the  new  Christians,  and 
then  our  kings  have  not  much  trouble  in  accomplishing 
the  rest. ' ' 

When  the  Spaniards  attempted  to  get  a  foothold,  an 
edict  expelhng  missionaries,  promulgated  in  1587  but  only 
mildly  enforced,  was  invoked  to  save  the  country  from  the 
peril  of  foreign  domination.  But  Jesuits  and  Franciscans 
returned  in  disguise,  and  massacres  of  Christians  followed. 
It  took  forty  years  to  extirpate  Christianity.  To  accom- 
plish this,  all  intercourse  with  Europe  had  to  be  stopped. 
From  1639  to  1853  trade  relations  with  the  outside  world 
were  entirely  severed. 

When,  through  the  inevitable  development  of  world  trade 

130 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  CHINA  (1894-1895)  131 

as  a  result  of  the  revolution  in  transportation  and  industiy, 
the  Asiatic  coast  of  the  Pacific  began  to  be  more  frequented 
by  the  ships  and  traders  of  the  Occident,  it  was  impossible 
for  Japan  to  preserve  her  isolation.  Russia  was  pressing 
on  China  from  the  north  and  Great  Britain  and  France 
from  the  south.  In  the  course  of  time  one  of  the  three 
powers  would  certainly  have  seized  a  foothold  on  Japanese 
islands  in  its  struggle  against  the  others  for  commercial 
mastery  of  the  Far  East.  The  United  States,  however, 
anticipated  this  extension  of  European  eminent  domain. 

The  development  of  the  whaling  industry  in  Alaskan 
waters  resulted  in  frequent  shipwreck  of  Americans  on 
Japanese  islands,  and  the  first  visits  of  American  ships  to 
Japanese  ports  were  to  secure  the  release  of  American 
sailors  and  to  return  Japanese  seamen  shipwrecked  on  our 
own  Pacific  coast.  In  1846  two  American  war-ships  an- 
chored off  Uraga,  and  Commodore  Biddle  made  an  official 
overture  for  trade  relations.  The  refusal  was  categorical, 
and  the  commodore  did  not  insist. 

The  acquisition  and  rapid  development  of  California, 
follo\\dng  close  upon  the  failure  of  Commodore  Biddle, 
prompted  a  second  and  more  insistent  overture.  Com- 
manding a  squadron  of  four  war-ships.  Commodore  Perry 
appeared  in  Uraga  Bay  in  1853.  He  brought  a  letter  from 
President  Pierce,  and  said  that  he  would  return  for  an 
answer.  By  the  time  he  came  back,  in  February,  1854, 
the  Japanese  had  made  up  their  minds  to  abandon  the 
policy  of  non-intercourse,  because  they  were  convinced  that 
it  could  not  be  maintained.  Perry  had  made  a  profound 
impression.  He  had  uttered  no  threats;  but  when  he 
returned  with  ten  ships  instead  of  four,  the  Japanese 
realized  that  if  they  did  not  sign  a  commercial  treaty 
voluntarily  they  would  be  forced  to  do  so. 

Now  that  international  relations  had  become  a  world 
necessity,  Japan  could  not  remain  aloof.  Even  if  she  could 
have  lived  on  without  foreign  commerce,  her  islands  lay 


132         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

along  one  of  the  world's  great  trade  routes.  Questions 
arose  as  to  lighthouses,  the  charting  of  straits,  open  ports 
for  coaling  and  refuge  against  storm,  neutrality  in  the 
event  of  war.  And  behind  loomed  the  great  issue  of  a 
recognized  international  status  for  Japan  in  order  to  pre- 
vent conflicts  in  the  political  and  commercial  rivalry  of  the 
Occidental  powers  in  the  Far  East. 

It  took  nearly  fifteen  years  for  the  Japanese  to  reconcile 
themselves  to  the  presence  of  foreigners  and  the  penetra- 
tion of  Occidental  civilization.  The  treaties  negotiated  by 
the  United  States  and  the  European  powers  were  not  ac- 
cepted immediately.  In  unison  and  separately,  the  powers 
made  naval  demonstrations,  and  tmce  there  were  bombard- 
ments. The  Japanese  finally  accepted  the  new  order,  not 
because  they  had  become  convinced  of  the  superiority  of 
our  ways  over  theirs,  but  in  self-defense. 

Japan  began  the  deliberate  process  of  Occidentalizing 
herself  in  1866.  The  result  has  been  unique  and  startling 
— unique  because  Japan  kept  her  independence,  startling 
because  she  has  turned  the  tables  on  us  and  is  beating  us 
at  our  own  game.  The  aim  of  the  European  powers  and 
the  United  States  in  the  development  of  world  politics  is 
the  extension  of  political  control  to  secure  markets  and 
investment  or  colonizing  areas. ^  Until  we  confronted  the 
new  Japan,  we  assumed  that  the  modern  world  order  neces- 
sitated the  political  and  economic  subordination  to  th6 
white  race  of  all  other  races.  Where  exclusive  control  by 
one  Caucasian  race  was  denied  by  other  Caucasian  races, 
wars  were  fought  or  threatened,  and  international  diplo- 
macy arranged  spheres  of  influence.  During  the  past  fifty 
years  Japan  succeeded  first  in  eluding  Caucasian  overlord- 
ship,  and  then  in  setting  herself  up  as  one  of  the  great 

*  We  must  remember  that  if  the  United  States  lays  claim  to  a  more  altruistic 
foreign  policy  than  the  other  powers,  it  is  because  our  entry  into  world  politics 
came  much  later  than  that  of  European  states.  The  reasons  for  this  are 
explained  in  Chapter  XLVI.  With  surplus  capital  to  invest  and  overseas  trade 
to  develop,  where  temptations  have  confronted  us  our  policy  has  been  different 
only  in  degree  from  that  of  the  other  powers. 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  CHINA  (1894-1895)  133 

powers  whose  claims  could  not  be  ignored  in  the  delimita- 
tion of  spheres  of  influence. 

Consequently,  in  the  study  of  world  politics  we  must 
make  a  place  for  Japan  among  the  world  powers.  She  can 
not  be  considered  in  a  category  apart  from  the  rest  of  us. 
Her  international  relations  have  followed  the  same  evolu- 
tion, have  been  inspired  by  the  same  motives,  have  been 
guided  by  the  same  laws,  and  have  displayed  the  same 
phenomena.  Japan's  foreign  policy,  like  that  of  European 
powers,  is  explained  by  the  instinct  of  self-preser\^ation 
and  the  belief  that  prosperity  depends  upon  a  place  in  the 
sun  secured  by  the  exploitation  of  alien  races  through  the 
use  of  force. 

Japan  had  a  long  struggle,  however,  to  free  herself  from 
the  infringements  upon  her  sovereignty  established  by  the 
original  treaties  vntli  the  United  States  and  the  European 
powers.  During  her  first  thirty  years  of  contact  with  the 
world  she  allowed  foreigners  capitulatory  rights  similar  to 
those  enjoyed  by  Europeans  and  Americans  in  other  Asi- 
atic countries.  Originally,  judicial  and  fiscal  autonomy 
and  extra-territoriality  within  prescribed  areas  had  been 
as  necessary  for  foreigners  in  Japan  as  in  other  countries 
where  laws  and  customs  were  widely  divergent  from  those 
of  the  Occident. 

But  when  Japan  became  what  we  call  a  civilized  nation, 
with  a  judicial  system  like  ours,  and  when  the  Japanese 
government  was  in  a  position  to  assure  the  protection  of 
the  rights  of  foreigners  in  every  part  of  the  country,  the 
continuance  of  the  capitulatory  regime  served  only  to  work 
against  the  interests  of  the  Japanese  in  their  own  land. 
In  1878,  contingent  upon  similar  action  by  the  other  powers, 
the  United  States  agreed  to  the  abolition  of  special  privi- 
leges for  Americans.  Not  until  1894,  however,  following 
eleven  years  of  constant  negotiations,  were  the  old  treaties 
finally  abrogated.  Immediately  after  Japan  became  mis- 
tress in  her  own  house  and  was  received  by  the  other  powers 


134  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

on  a  footing  of  equality,  she  issued  her  first  challenge  to 
the  doctrine  of  European  eminent  domain. 

The  peninsula  of  Korea  juts  out  from  the  mainland  of 
Asia  towards  Japan  between  the  Japan  Sea  and  the  Yellow 
Sea.  The  Japan  Sea  is  as  important  to  Japan  as  is  the 
North  Sea  to  Great  Britain.  The  Yellow  Sea  is  as  im- 
portant to  China  as  is  the  stretch  of  the  Atlantic  between 
Boston  and  Newport  News  to  the  United  States.  Korea 
has  been  called  a  dagger  pointed  at  the  heart  of  Japan. 
This  expression  is  no  exaggeration.  Were  Korea  in  the 
hands  of  any  European  power,  the  menace  to  Japan  would 
be  as  the  menace  to  Great  Britain  of  Belgium  in  the  hands 
of  Germany.  A  European  power  ensconced  in  Korea  could 
separate  Japan  from  China  and  control  the  outlet  of  north- 
ern China  to  the  Pacific. 

For  many  centuries  Korea,  like  Japan,  was  a  closed 
country.  Attempts  of  missionaries  and  traders  to  pene- 
trate the  peninsula  were  successfully  resisted.  Japan  was 
open  to  foreign  influence  several  decades  before  the 
Koreans  were  forced  to  allow  foreigners  to  settle  in  their 
country.  This  fact  alone  frustrated  the  complete  triumph 
of  European  eminent  domain  in  Asia.  For  when  the 
Koreans  were  called  upon  to  incur  the  fate  of  other  weak 
and  backward  Asiatic  nations,  the  Japanese  had  become 
strong  enough  to  have  a  foreign  policy  of  their  own  and 
to  anticipate  the  ambitions  of  European  imperialism.  The 
fear  that  Russia  or  Great  Britain  would  get  control  of 
Korea  led  Japan  to  interfere  in  the  internal  affairs  of  the 
''hermit  kingdom,"  to  fight  two  costly  wars,  and  finally  to 
annex  the  whole  peninsula. 

Between  1876  and  1892  the  ports  and  interior  of  Korea 
were  opened  to  foreign  settlement,  trade,  and  uiissionary 
effort  by  treaties  with  Japan,  the  United  States,  Germany, 
Great  Britain,  Italy,  Russia,  France,  and  Austria-Hungary. 
Immediately  diplomatic  agents  of  the  powers  began  the 
traditional  game  of  intriguing  for  exclusive  concessions 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  CHINA  (1894-1895)  135 

and  political  influence.  As  elsewhere  in  Asia,  their  efforts 
were  powerfully  helped  by  civil  war  and  administrative 
anarchy,  which  they  encouraged  as  much  as  they  could. 
Plots  were  hatched  in  foreign  legations,  and  unsuccessful 
revolutionaries  found  refuge  in  the  legations.  Under  cover 
of  the  political  instability  of  the  first  decade  of  Korea's 
entrance  into  the  family  of  nations,  the  European  powers 
tried  to  secure  concessions  for  naval  stations  and  to  block 
the  efforts  of  others  in  this  direction.  Japan  championed 
complete  Korean  independence  and  opposed  every  scheme 
of  Europeans  to  install  themselves  in  the  peninsula.  When 
they  saw  that  they  could  accomplish  nothing  against  Japa- 
nese influence  at  Seoul,  the  powers  remembered  that  Cliina 
was  the  suzerain  of  Korea.  Chinese  statesmen  were  sus- 
ceptible to  suggestions  from  all  sides  that  they  assert  the 
rights  of  China  in  Korea;  and,  through  fear  and  distrust 
of  Japan,  the  Koreans  were  betraj^ed  into  the  fatal  mistake 
of  plajdng  up  to  China  against  Japan. 

In  May,  1894,  the  situation  that  had  been  developing  for 
years  came  to  a  crisis.  The  Korean  government  appealed 
to  China  for  aid  in  putting  down  a  serious  insurrection. 
Without  asking  the  cooperation  of  Japan,  China  sent  to 
Seoul  two  thousand  soldiers.  This  was  a  denial  of  the 
claim  of  equal  interest  in  Korea,  which  Japan  had  been 
emphasizing  for  some  years.  Hence,  on  June  9,  Japan 
landed  an  army  of  twelve  thousand  in  Korea,  and  then 
proposed  to  the  Korean  government  the  adoption  of  a  pro- 
gram of  reforms  essential  to  the  maintenance  of  Korean 
independence. 

A  new  era  was  beginning  in  the  history  of  the  Far  East. 
In  their  relations  with  each  other,  Japan  and  China  had 
come  to  the  point  where  they  would  have  to  adopt  a  com- 
mon pohcy  in  regard  to  European  influences  or  become 
enemies.  Against  the  protests  of  Japan,  China  had  been 
granting  concessions  to  the  great  powers  that  threatened 
to  put  the  Far  East  under  European  control.     The  weak- 


136  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ness  and  corruption  of  Chinese  statesmen  were  compromis- 
ing the  interests  of  Japan  as  well  as  the  interests  of  China. 
Russia,  for  instance,  had  been  given  by  China  a  strong 
foothold  on  the  coast  of  the  Japan  Sea  north  of  Korea. 
The  Japanese  did  not  propose  to  permit  Chinese  suzerainty 
in  Korea  to  balk  their  efforts  to  prevent  the  granting  of 
concessions  to  European  powers  in  the  peninsula  between 
the  Yellow  Sea  and  the  Japan  Sea.  Japan  invited  China 
to  join  in  helping  Korea  carry  out  the  reasonable  and  prac- 
ticable program  of  reforms  suggested.  The  answer  of 
China  was  to  advise  Korea  to  reject  the  Japanese  proposal. 

On  July  23  Japanese  troops  seized  the  palace  at  Seoul 
and  made  the  king  prisoner;  and  on  August  1  both  China 
and  Japan  declared  war.  The  operations  lasted,  on  land 
and  sea,  from  September,  1894,  to  March,  1895,  and  ended 
in  the  complete  defeat  of  Cliina.  This  was  the  first  mani- 
festation to  the  world  of  Japanese  militarj^  and  naval 
power.  On  April  17,  1895,  by  the  treaty  of  Shimonoseki, 
China  acknowledged  the  independence  of  Korea,  ceded 
Formosa,  the  Pescadores,  and  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  to 
Japan,  and  agreed  to  pay  an  indemnity  of  $158,000,000. 

Aghast  at  the  success  of  Japan  and  determined  to  pre- 
vent a  rival  from  entering  where  she  aimed  to  rule,  Russia 
asked  the  great  powers  to  intervene  to  preserve  the  balance 
of  power  in  the  Far  East.  France  and  Germany  answered 
favorably.^  The  three  powers,  posing  as  defenders  of  the 
integrity  of  China,  threatened  Japan  with  a  new  war  un- 
less the  territory  ceded  by  China  on  the  mainland  was 
relinquished.  Japan  had  to  bow  to  superior  force  and 
gave  up  the  Liao-tung  peninsula.  In  return,  China  agreed 
to  pay  additional  indemnity  to  the  amount  of  $22,000,000. 

Although  the  Japanese  felt  very  bitterly  over  the  loss 
of  the  principal  fruits  of  victory,  the  intervention  of  the 

^  The  British  Foreign  Office  and  the  government  of  India  were  developing  a 
new  case  of  nerves  in  regard  to  Russian  penetration  in  Asia,  and  began  at  this 
time  the  new  leaning  in  Far  Eastern  policy  that  led  seven  years  later  to  the 
alliance  with  Japan. 


JAPAN'S  AVAR  WITH  CHINA  (1894-1895)  137 

three  powers  would  have  made  for  peace  had  the  motive 
behind  it  been  what  it  was  professed  to  be.  Soon,  however, 
the  Japanese  found  that  China  had  granted  a  railroad  con- 
cession to  Russia  in  northern  Manchuria,  and  had  ceded 
territory  to  France  in  the  Mekong  Valley.  In  addition, 
both  powers  obtained  concessions  of  land  at  Hankow ;  Rus- 
sia was  assured  of  the  reversion  of  Port  Arthur,  which  she 
was  to  help  fortify;  and  France  was  given  important  rail- 
road and  mining  rights  in  the  southern  provinces  of  China. 
And  Russia  became  the  guarantor  of  a  loan  floated  in  Paris 
to  pay  the  first  instalment  of  the  Japanese  indemnity. 
Two  years  later,  in  1897,  Germany  received  her  reward  in 
the  Shantung  peninsula.^ 

When  the  Japanese  saw  that  the  European  powers  them- 
selves were  ready  to  resort  to  force  to  exploit  China  and 
to  prevent  Japan  from  sharing  in  the  exploitation,  they 
realized  that  they  would  have  to  prepare  for  a  test  of  arms 
with  the  European  powers  or  become,  in  relation  to  Europe, 
as  other  Asiatic  nations  were.  They  could  not  fight  against 
the  united  white  race.  They  must  seek  an  occasion  to 
attack  the  Caucasian  nations  separately,  and,  if  possible, 
be  allied  in  the  future  wars  with  some  of  their  rivals  while 
they  were  eliminating  others  from  the  Far  East. 

The  intervention  of  Russia,  France,  and  Germany  robbed 
Japan  of  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  and  made  certain  an- 
other and  more  difficult  war  mthin  a  few  years.  Yet  it 
brought  her  distinct  advantages.  She  had  become  a  factor 
to  be  reckoned  with  in  international  politics.  She  had  as- 
serted her  determination  to  play  an  important  role  in 
China,  and  had  won  the  unquestioned  right  to  be  a  partner 
on  an  equal  footing  with  the  other  powers  in  any  joint 
intervention  in  Chinese  affairs.  In  annexing  Formosa  and 
the  Pescadores  she  had  removed  the  danger  of  an  enemy 
naval  base  on  her  routes  southward  and  westward,  the  two 
important  lines  of  communication  with  the   rest   of  the 

^See  pp.  142,  200-202,  319. 


138  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

world.  The  immediate  objective  of  the  war  was  won. 
China  was  eliminated  from  Korea,  and  Japan  no  longer 
had  to  watch  intrigues  at  Peking  in  connection  with  the 
ambitions  of  foreign  powers  in  the  peninsula. 

The  Japanese  went  ahead  with  the  program  of  reforms 
originally  proposed  to  be  undertaken  jointly  with  China, 
and  Korea  began  to  adapt  herself  to  the  necessary  condi- 
tions of  existence  as  a  modern  state.  If  the  use  of  an 
army  and  a  fleet  by  the  Japanese  was  a  revelation  to  Eu- 
rope, the  work  of  Japanese  counselors  in  Korea  during  the 
months  following  the  war  gave  the  spectacle  of  a  new  and 
disquieting  stumbling-block  in  the  path  of  European  Far 
Eastern  ambitions.  The  Japanese  demonstrated  that  they 
had  been  studying  the  constructive  side  of  European  civil- 
ization no  less  carefully  than  military  and  naval  matters. 

Excellent  and  wise  in  conception  as  were  the  Japanese 
reforms,  the  application  of  them  was  resented  by  a  high- 
spirited  people.  The  Koreans  felt  that  they  were  being 
made  to  bear  the  burden  of  the  disappointment  and  bitter- 
ness of  the  Japanese,  who  had  built  high  hopes  upon  the 
victory  over  China.  Moreover,  Eussia  had  not  withdrawn 
from  the  struggle  for  the  control  of  Korea.  She  was  quick 
to  take  advantage  of  the  growing  hatred  against  Japan, 
which,  on  October  8,  1895,  culminated  in  the  storming  of 
the  palace  and  the  assassination  of  the  queen  by  a  mob  of 
Japanese  partizans,  among  whom  were  Japanese  soldiers. 
The  king  took  refuge  in  the  Russian  legation.  Encour- 
aged and  powerfully  aided  by  Russia,  he  not  only  reestab- 
lished the  absolutist  regime  and  abolished  the  reforms,  but 
assumed  the  title  of  emperor.  At  the  close  of  the  century 
international  intrigue  in  Seoul  was  worse  than  before  the 
Sino-Japanese  war.  Several  powers  again  vied  with  one 
another  for  concessions  and  privileges.  But,  with  China 
eliminated,  the  competition  for  control  soon  narrowed  do^vn 
to  a  duel  between  Korea's  other  neighbors,  Russia  and 
Japan. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902) 

THERE  is  a  parallel  between  the  situation  in  the  Near 
East  after  the  Russo-Turkish  War  and  that  in  the 
Far  East  after  the  Sino-Japanese  War.  In  1878  Great 
Britain  intervened  in  the  Near  East  to  defend  the  integrity 
of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  menaced  by  the  treaty  of  San 
Stefano.  Russia,  exhausted  by  her  effort  and  unable  to 
fight  another  war,  agreed  to  the  revision  of  the  treaty  by 
the  Congress  of  BerHn.  As  a  reward  for  her  aid.  Great 
Britain  took  Cj^nis  from  Turkey,  and  shortly  afterwards 
ensconced  herself  in  Egj^it.  In  1895  Russia,  France,  and 
Germany  intervened  in  the  Far  East  to  defend  the  integrity 
of  the  Chinese  Empire,  menaced  by  the  treaty  of  Shimono- 
seki.  Japan  could  not  undertake  another  war,  and  had  to 
yield.  Russia  and  France  immediately,  and  Germany  two 
years  later,  made  China  pay  a  larger  price  than  the  loss  of 
the  Liao-tung  peninsula  would  have  been. 

In  fact,  if  we  leave  France  and  Germany  out  of  the  reck- 
oning and  consider  only  what  Russia's  share  in  the  inter- 
vention cost  China,  we  find  that  China  had  to  borrow  mth 
a  Russian  guaranty  the  money  to  indemnify  Japan  for 
releasing  the  Liao-tung  peninsula.  The  compensation  for 
the  guaranty  was  a  railway  concession  in  northern  Man- 
churia. Within  very  few  years  Russia  was  in  possession 
of  northern  Manchuria  and  had  taken  Japan's  place  in 
Liao-tung  besides;  and  China  owed  Russia  several  times 
the  amount  she  had  paid  to  get  Russia  to  prevent  Japan 
from  doing  what  Russia  did.  Great  Britain's  aid  to  Tur- 
key was  the  beginning  of  the  partition  of  the  Ottoman  Em- 
pire.    Russia's  aid  to   China  was  the  beginning  of  the 

139 


140         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

partition  of  the  Chinese  Empire.  One  feels  that  a  weak 
state  would  do  well  to  give  ^neas  's  answer  to  the  proffered 
aid  of  a  great  power:  "Timeo  Danaos  et  dona  ferentes." 

The  intervention  of  the  powers  proved  more  disastrous 
to  China  than  to  Japan.  For  Japan,  it  was  a  temporary- 
setback.  In  China,  it  was  the  entering  wedge  of  spoliation 
for  both  Russia  and  the  other  powers.  The  surrender  of 
Chinese  statesmen  to  the  rapacious  demands  of  the  Euro- 
pean powers  led  directly  to  the  Boxer  Rebellion,  which,  in 
turn,  gave  the  powers  an  excuse  for  trussing  China  more 
completely. 

Great  Britain  was  invited  to  aid  in  modifying  the  treaty 
of  Shimonoseki,  but  took  no  part  and  gave  the  Russians 
no  encouragement.  The  British  were  not  on  friendly  terms 
mth  Russia  and  France  in  Asia,  and  they  had  been  quick 
to  grasp  the  significance  of  the  naval  and  military  prowess 
shown  by  Japan.  There  was  no  reason  for  antagonizing 
the  Japanese  in  a  matter  in  which  they  had  little  interest. 
The  Germans  showed  less  political  acumen.  They,  too, 
had  no  motive  comparable  to  that  of  Russia  in  preventing 
the  execution  of  the  treaty.  But  Kaiser  Wilhelm's  obses- 
sion of  'Uhe  yellow  peril"  led  them  into  an  unnecessary 
joint  action  with  Russia  and  France.  The  Germans  of- 
fended the  Japanese  for  nothing.  With  the  French  it  was 
different.  The  Quai  d'Orsay  was  preparing  a  political 
alliance  with  Russia,  and  outstanding  negotiations  concern- 
ing the  frontiers  of  Indo-China  with  Siam  and  China  made 
it  a  wise  move  to  put  Peking  under  obligations  to  Paris. 

For  half  a  century  before  the  Sino-Japanese  War,  Great 
Britain,  France,  and  Russia  had  been  preying  upon  China. 
After  1895  Japan  and  Germany  determined  to  get  a  share 
of  the  loot.  The  ambitions  of  both  of  these  late-comers 
might  have  been  thwarted  had  the  other  powers  been  con- 
tent to  maintain  the  status  quo.  But  no  power  was  wilKng 
to  become  the  sponsor  of  China's  territorial  integrity  and 
sovereignty. 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)         141 

On  March  1,  1894,  an  Anglo-Chinese  treaty,  fixing  the 
Burma  boundarj^  transferred  to  China  territory  east  of  the 
Mekong  River,  with  the  stipulation,  however,  that  it  shoukl 
remain  under  Chinese  sovereignty.  This  was  Great  Brit- 
ain's answer  to  the  Franco-Siamese  treaty  of  the  previous 
year,  by  which  France  had  extended  her  Indo-Chinese 
frontier  to  the  Mekong.  But  the  plans  of  the  British  mis- 
carried. On  June  20,  1895,  China  signed  with  France  a 
treaty  that  was  the  beginning  of  a  long  series  of  European 
depredations.  The  territory  lately  acquired  from  Great 
Britain  was  now  turned  over  to  the  French,  together  with 
mining  concessions  and  railway  rights  in  the  Kiangsi  and 
Yunnan  provinces.  Serious  anti-foreign  uprisings  took 
place,  directed  against  missionaries  because  they  happened 
to  be  the  only  foreigners  scattered  in  the  interior. 

Great  Britain  protested  against  the  Franco-Chinese 
treaty  on  the  ground  that  it  was  a  violation  of  the  Anglo- 
Chinese  treaty.  But  instead  of  insisting  that  France 
should  give  up  what  she  had  received,  and  standing  behind 
China  in  a  policy  of  special  privileges  for  none  and  equal 
opportunity  for  all,  the  British  forced  China  to  ''make 
compensation"  by  agreeing  to  a  further  extension  of  the 
frontiers  of  Burma.  And  on  January  1,  1896,  Great  Brit- 
ain and  France  signed  an  agreement  primarily  concerning 
Siam,  but  introducing  the  principle  of  spheres  of  influence 
in  China.  These  negotiations  initiated  a  policy  in  regard 
to  China  that  has  been  continued  up  to  the  present  time. 
The  great  powers,  including  Japan,  have  pressed  at  Peking 
claims  for  territorial  rights  and  concessions  of  every  sort, 
and  when  the  claims  conflicted  have  settled  their  difficulties 
by  negotiations  with  one  another  in  which  China,  the  party 
chiefly  interested,  has  had  no  part.  The  Shantung  clauses 
of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  were  not  a  new  departure  in  Far 
Eastern  diplomacy,  but  conformed  to  a  policy  that  began 
when  the  treaty  of  Shimonoseki  was  revised. 

From  1896  to  1899  the  great  powers  worked  feverishly  to 


142         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

establish  political  and  economic  control  over  China.  On 
September  8,  1896,  the  Chinese-Russian  agreement,  signed 
at  Peking,  gave  Russia  the  right  to  build  the  main  line  of 
the  Trans-Siberian  Railway  across  Manchuria,  and,  in 
clauses  that  were  afterwards  made  more  sweeping,  vir- 
tually turned  over  northern  Manchuria  to  that  power.  On 
November  14,  1897,  a  German  fleet  entered  Kiau-chau,  on 
the  Shantung  peninsula;  a  Russian  fleet  entered  Port  Ar- 
thur, on  the  Liao-tung  peninsula,  on  December  18, 1897.  In 
March,  1898,  China  leased  Kiau-chau  to  Germany  for 
ninety-nine  years  and  Port  Arthur  to  Russia  for  twenty- 
five  years.  The  German  lease  carried  with  it  a  sphere  of 
influence  and  railway  and  mining  concessions,  while  the 
Russian  lease  made  Port  Arthur  a  closed  naval  base  and 
gave  Russia  the  right  to  connect  the  leased  territory  with 
the  Trans-Siberian  Railway  in  Manchuria.  In  April,  China 
leased  to  France  Kwang-chau  for  ninety-nine  years,  with 
railway  concessions.  On  June  9  Great  Britain  secured  a 
lease  of  mainland  territory  adjoining  Hong-Kong,  and  on 
July  1  China  agreed  to  let  Great  Britain  have  Wei-hai-wei, 
on  the  north  shore  of  the  Shantung  peninsula,  for  as  long 
as  Russia  occupied  Port  Arthur.  Italy  came  into  the  game 
at  the  beginning  of  1899  with  a  demand  for  a  lease  of  a 
bay  on  the  coast  of  Chekiang  Province,  with  hinterland 
concessions ;  but,  as  the  Italians  did  not  have  naval  forces 
adequate  to  make  good  her  demand,  China  was  in  this  case 
able  to  refuse. 

The  danger  of  wars  among  the  powers  over  encroach- 
ments on  Chinese  sovereignty  was  avoided  by  reciprocal 
arrangements  which  they  were  able  to  work  out.  On  April 
25,  1898,  Russia  agreed  to  recognize  Japan's  paramount 
interest  in  Korea  in  return  for  Japan's  acceptance  of  the 
Russian  naval  base  at  Port  Arthur.  A  year  later,  April 
29, 1899,  Russia  and  Great  Britain  decided  upon  spheres  of 
influence  in  China.     Russia  promised  not  to  seek  conces- 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        143 

sions  in  the  Yangtze  Valley,  wliicli  meant  central  China, 
and  Great  Britain  agreed  to  abandon  to  Russia  everything 
north  of  the  Great  Wall. 

Along  with  the  treaties  and  agreements  by  which  control 
of  territory  passed  out  of  Chinese  hands,  loans  and  con- 
cessions further  weakened  China  and  paved  the  way  for 
partition.  Railway  and  mining  concessions  were  granted 
to  French,  Belgian,  British,  Russian,  German,  and  Ameri- 
can companies.  These  arrangements  offered  Hmitless  op- 
portunities for  interference  and  brought  the  people  of 
many  localities  into  conflict  with  the  foreigners.  The 
Chinese  government  was  forced  into  the  position  of  having 
to  take  sides  against  its  own  subjects  in  defense  of  for- 
eigners who  were  shocking  the  sensibilities  and  sometimes 
disregarding  the  rights  of  the  Chinese.  At  the  same  time, 
the  Chinese  were  for  the  first  time  in  their  history  begin- 
ning to  feel  the  burden  of  taxes  collected  for  the  benefit, 
as  they  saw  it,  of  foreigners.  China  borrowed  abroad  large 
sums  in  gold  to  pay  the  costs  of  the  war  with  Japan  and 
to  meet  the  Japanese  indemnity.  In  1898  she  owed  nearly 
$265,000,000  to  foreigners,  all  contracted  within  four  years, 
with  interest  payable  in  gold.  The  loans  were  secured  by 
customs  receipts,  over  which  Europeans  were  given  control. 

While  the  spoliation  of  China  was  rapidly  progressing, 
the  United  States  suddenly  became  a  colonial  power  with 
special  interests  in  the  Far  East.  The  American  people 
thought  of  the  battle  of  Manila  Bay,  May  1,  1898,  only  in 
terms  of  a  victory  in  the  war  they  were  fighting,  and  did 
not  realize  what  it  meant  to  fall  heir  to  Spain's  largest 
Pacific  possession.  In  fact,  even  after  the  treaty  of  peace 
with  Spain  was  signed,  few  Americans  understood  that 
the  United  States  had  become  a  world  power.  Public  opin- 
ion was  not  ready  to  back  an  aggressive  American  foreign 
policy.  This  fact,  known  to  European  statesmen,  pre- 
vented our  State  Department  from  registering  an  emphatic 


144         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

protest  and  from  assuring  China  that  the  United  States 
would  back  her  in  refusing  to  yield  to  the  European 
demands. 

Secretary  Hay,  however,  did  the  best  he  could  under 
the  difficult  handicap  of  American  apathy  and  indifference. 
On  September  6,  1899,  he  addressed  an  identical  note  to 
Great  Britain,  Russia,  and  Germany — and  later  to  France, 
Italy,  and  Japan — asking  them  to  agree  to  the  principle  of 
the  ''open  door"  in  China.  Under  the  interpretation  of 
the  open  door  to  which  he  demanded  assent,  no  power 
could  claim  an  exclusive  sphere  of  influence;  the  Chinese 
tariff  was  to  continue  in  full  force  throughout  the  empire 
and  to  be  administered  by  Chinese  officials ;  and  all  nations 
were  to  be  treated  on  a  footing  of  equality  in  port  dues  and 
railway  rates,  irrespective  of  special  agreements  entered 
into  between  China  and  any  other  power  or  between  any 
two  powers. 

In  their  answers  the  powers  approved  the  American  posi- 
tion and  stated  that  it  was  their  own.  But  none  of  them 
would  bind  itself  explicitly  to  the  open  door.  To  keep  the 
door  open  would  have  required  a  show  of  force,  leading 
perhaps  even  to  the  use  of  force.  American  interests  were 
not  sufficiently  important  to  warrant  more  than  an  aca- 
demic statement  of  our  position.  Meanwhile  the  greed, 
brutality,  and  hypocrisy  of  concession-hunters,  officially 
backed  by  their  respective  governments,  further  aroused 
the  resentment  of  the  peace-loving  Chinese  and  prepared 
the  way  for  the  Boxer  Rebellion.  In  the  mad  struggle  for 
leases  and  spheres  of  influence,  Peking  became  a  storm 
center  of  international  politics,  with  each  power  pitted 
against  the  others.  In  this  imbroglio  Japan,  following 
European  methods,  became  a  powerful  factor,  disturbing 
the  combinations  that  had  up  to  this  time  been  purely  Euro- 
pean. Occasions  for  friction  were  increased.  The  Japa- 
nese had  originally  interested  themselves  in  China  to  pro- 
tect Japan  and  make  Asia  safe  for  the  Asiatics ;  but  now 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        145 

Japanese  capitalists  and  government  officials  were  yielding 
to  the  temptation  to  despoil  China  for  profit. 

At  this  juncture  two  forces  arose  to  prevent  the  partition 
of  China,  or  at  least  the  further  impairment  of  Chinese 
sovereignty  and  the  economic  exploitation  of  the  country 
by  foreigners. 

The  first  of  these  was  the  ferment  of  dissatisfaction 
among  the  Young  Chinese,  belonging  to  the  official  and 
commercial  classes  in  the  ports,  who  had  come  under  the 
influence  of  Western  education  and  who  realized  that  the 
strength  of  Japan  as  opposed  to  the  weakness  of  China  lay 
in  Japan's  successful  adaptation  of  Western  civilization. 
The  Young  Chinese  beheved  that  their  country  could  be 
saved  from  humiliation  and  slavery  by  the  spread  of  West- 
em  education  and  by  adopting  Occidental  methods.  As 
these  things  could  be  learned  only  by  more  intimate  con- 
tact with  Occidentals,  they  opposed  neither  missionaries 
nor  concession-developers,  and  regarded  treaty  ports  and 
foreign-built  and  foreign-run  railways  as  necessary  evils — 
to  be  endured  until  the  nation  was  transformed.  To  rid 
the  country  of  European  influence  and  domination  meant 
that  there  must  be  reforms  in  the  administration,  a 
stronger  army  and  navy,  a  national  spirit  created  through 
schools  and  newspapers,  and  eventually  the  overthrow  of 
the  Manchu  dynasty  with  its  military  and  civilian  official- 
dom, which  was  always  susceptible  to  the  bribes  of  foreign 
legations. 

The  other  force  was  the  spirit  of  reaction  dominating 
those  who  wanted  to  see  China  undisturbed  by  Occidental 
influences.  The  reactionaries  were  not  interested,  as  were 
the  Young  Chinese,  in  a  strong  and  united  China  holding 
her  own  mth  the  great  powers  by  adopting  and  developing 
the  sources  of  strength  of  the  modern  state.  They  hated 
the  foreigners  because  they  instinctively  felt  that  foreign 
control  not  only  would  provoke  a  movement  of  regeneration 
in  China,  but  would  also  limit  and  destroy  their  power  and 


146         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

privileges.  The  effort  for  reform  inaugurated  by  the 
Young  Chinese  in  1898  caused  them  as  much  alarm  as  the 
encroachment  of  the  European  powers  and  Japan.  The 
reactionaries  prevailed  over  the  Young  Chinese  because 
they  were  able  to  make  use  of  a  powerful  agency  to  arouse 
the  hatred  of  the  common  people. 

The  war  with  Japan  led  to  the  foundation,  in  1895,  of  a 
secret  anti-foreign  society,  I-Ho-Chuan  (''the  righteous 
harmony  fists").  The  members  of  this  organization,  called 
Boxers  by  missionaries  and  newspapers,  were  deceived  by 
the  ritual  of  initiation  into  believing  that  they  were  made 
invulnerable  to  swords  and  bullets.  Gathering  in  Taoist 
and  Buddhist  temples,  they  swore  to  drive  the  foreigner 
and  his  religion  out  of  China.  The  movement  spread  rap- 
idly in  the  northern  provinces,  and  was  helped  by  the 
affairs  of  Kiau-chau,  Wei-hai-wei,  and  Port  Arthur.  The 
building  of  railways  and  the  development  of  mines  by  for- 
eigners, and  the  creation  of  concession  settlements  in  ports 
and  railway  centers,  fanned  the  flame  of  hatred. 

In  1899  Yu-Hsien,  founder  of  I-Ho-Chuan,  became  gov- 
ernor of  the  province  of  Shantung.  Attacks  upon  foreign- 
ers began  almost  immediately.  The  murder  of  English 
missionaries  in  Shantung  brought  forth  a  strong  protest 
from  the  British,  French,  German,  and  American  ministers. 
In  spite  of  promises  from  the  empress-dowager,  who  was 
all-powerful,  that  the  guilty  parties  would  be  punished,  out- 
rages and  murders  became  more  frequent,  both  in  Shan- 
tung and  in  Chih-li,  the  province  in  which  Peking  is  located. 
In  March,  1900,  another  protest  of  the  ministers,  this  time 
with  the  addition  of  the  Italian  minister,  resulted  in  the 
appointment  of  Yuan-Shih-Kai  as  governor  of  Shantung, 
with  orders  to  suppress  the  Boxers  and  an  imperial  re- 
script to  the  governor  of  Chih-li  denouncing  by  name  the 
Boxer  Society. 

The  empress-dowager  soon  showed  that  she  was  hand  in 
glove  with  the  Boxers.    She  secured  from  the  emperor  a 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        147 

decree  in  which  he  stated  that  because  of  bad  health  he 
could  not  have  a  son,  and  he  asked  the  empress-dowager 
to  select  a  successor  to  the  throne.  She  named  Pu  Chung, 
son  of  Prince  Tuan,  who  was  a  patron  of  the  Boxer  Society, 
and  the  headquarters  of  the  movement  were  established  in 
his  palace. 

A  Boxer  proclamation  was  issued  denouncing  the  em- 
peror and  the  mandarins  as  incompetent  and  corrupt,  and 
declaring : 

'^Foreign  devils  have  come  with  their  doctrine  of  Chris- 
tianity. Converts  to  their  own  Catholic  and  Protestant 
faiths  have  become  numerous.  These  churches  are  devoid 
of  human  principles  and  full  of  cunning.  They  have  at- 
tracted the  greedy  and  avaricious  as  converts  to  an  un- 
limited degree.  They  practise  oppression  and  comiption 
until  even  the  good  officials  have  become  covetous  of  foreign 
wealth  and  are  servants  to  the  foreigners.  Telegraphs 
and  railways  have  been  established;  foreign  cannon  and 
rifles  manufactured;  railway  engines  and  electric  lamps 
the  foreign  devils  delight  in.  .  .  .  The  foreigners  shall  be 
exterminated;  their  houses  and  temples  shall  be  burned; 
foreign  goods  and  property  of  every  description  shall  be 
destroyed.  The  foreigners  shall  be  extirpated,  for  the 
purpose  of  Heaven  is  determined.  A  clean  sweep  shall  be 
made.  All  this  shall  be  accomplished  within  three  years. 
The  wicked  can  not  escape  the  net  of  destruction." 

Prince  Tuan  made  clever  use  of  the  discussion  in  Euro- 
pean parhaments  and  press,  which  spoke  openly  of  the 
partition  of  China.  In  the  successful  encroachments  of 
France,  Eussia,  Germany,  and  Great  Britain,  and  in  the 
demand  of  Italy,  which  had  been  put  forward  at  Peking 
in  a  brutal  and  undiplomatic  manner,  he  had  full  proofs 
of  European  intentions.  Circulars  were  sent  to  the  provin- 
cial governors  announcing  the  approaching  massacre  of 
foreigners;  for  the  prince  made  no  effort  to  conceal  his 
intention  of  seizing  the  foreign  ministers  at  Peking  and 
holding  them  as  hostages  until  Europe  consented,  in  his 
own  words,  to  treat  China  '*as  a  sealed  book." 


148         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

The  Boxer  uprising,  whose  imminence  and  seriousness 
the  powers  had  failed  to  appreciate,  broke  out  in  Peking 
on  June  13,  1900.  The  railway  connecting  Peking  with 
Tientsin  was  literally  torn  up,  and  the  telegraph-poles 
were  sawed  off  close  to  the  ground.  All  foreign  property 
in  Peking  was  looted.  Bodies  were  taken  out  of  the  graves 
in  the  foreign  cemeteries  and  burned.  For  several  days 
Prince  Tuan  and  other  members  of  the  imperial  family 
directed  a  massacre  in  which  thousands  of  native  Chris- 
tians were  slain  and  which  ended  in  a  fire  that  burned  the 
principal  shops  of  Peking. 

Rescue  parties  sent  out  by  the  legations  saved  several 
hundred  women  and  children  who  had  escaped  death  by 
hiding,  and  the  foreigners  in  the  city  and  refugees  from 
the  surrounding  country  were  received  in  the  legations. 
On  June  19  the  foreign  ministers  were  informed  that  the 
powers  were  at  war  with  China,  and  that  they  must  leave 
within  twenty-four  hours  or  the  government  could  not  be 
responsible  for  their  safety.  As  it  was  impossible  to  start 
without  knowing  what  means  of  transport  were  available 
and  what  measures  had  been  taken  to  escort  the  foreigners 
to  the  coast,  the  ministers  asked  to  be  received  by  Prince 
Tuan  to  arrange  for  the  departure.  No  reply  came.  The 
next  morning,  after  a  meeting  at  the  French  legation,  they 
decided  to  go  in  a  body  to  make  representations  to  the 
government.  On  the  way  the  German  minister.  Baron  von 
Ketteler,  was  murdered  by  a  Manchu  oflScial  in  full  uni- 
form. The  Chinese  authorities  told  the  ministers  that  they 
could  give  no  guaranty  of  escort  to  Tientsin. 

For  nearly  two  months  about  six  thousand  foreigners 
and  Christian  refugees,  of  whom  more  than  half  were  in 
the  grounds  of  the  British  legation,  defended  themselves 
against  the  mob  and  against  government  troops.  When  it 
became  known  that  an  inter-allied  relief  column  was  ap- 
proaching Peking,  a  decree  was  issued  ordering  the  foreign 
ministers  to  be  conducted  safely  to  the  coast,  *'in  order 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)         149 

once  more  to  show  the  tenderness  of  the  Throne  for  the 
men  from  afar."  But  the  foreigners  preferred  to  trust  to 
their  own  resources.  On  August  11  government  troops 
began  to  bombard  the  British  legation.  The  relief  column 
reached  Peking  on  the  afternoon  of  the  13th,  just  two 
months  after  the  uprising  started.    It  was  none  too  soon. 

The  relief  of  Peking  was  an  international  operation.  A 
first  attempt  mth  small  forces  from  the  war-ships  of  dif- 
ferent navies  failed.  On  June  17  the  international  fleet 
had  to  fire  on  and  capture  the  Taku  forts.  Then  Tientsin 
was  occupied.  There  was  no  news  from  Peking,  and  it  was 
feared  that  all  the  Europeans  had  been  massacred.  The 
Russians  had  only  four  thousand  troops  within  reach,  and 
the  British  three  thousand.  Two  thousand  Americans 
were  despatched  from  the  Philippines  and  eight  hundred 
French  from  Indo-China.  The  Germans,  Austrians,  and 
Italians  had  virtually  no  free  effectives.  Japan  was  called 
upon  to  save  the  day.  She  contributed  ten  thousand 
troops,  half  of  the  force  that  finally  set  out  from  Tientsin 
on  August  4.  It  took  nine  days  to  reach  Peking,  and  the 
losses  of  the  international  army  were  severe.  On  the 
morning  after  the  entry  into  Peking,  the  empress-dowager 
and  the  imperial  court  fled  to  the  province  of  Shansi,  in 
the  interior.  But  resistance  continued,  and  the  imperial 
city  was  not  surrendered  until  August  26. 

After  the  relief  of  Peking  the  international  troops  con- 
tinued to  increase  in  number,  and  under  the  command  of 
Count  von  Waldersee  the  military  occupation  of  the  prov- 
ince of  Chih-li  was  organized.  There  were  divergent  views 
among  the  powers  as  to  the  attitude  to  adopt.  Russia  had 
agreed  to  the  expedition  only  to  relieve  the  legations,  and, 
considering  all  of  China  north  of  Peking  mthin  her  sphere 
of  influence,  she  proposed  to  the  associated  powers  the 
immediate  evacuation  of  Peking.  Japan  supported  this 
proposal  because  the  continuance  of  European  intervention 
was  prejudicial  to  her  interests.    The  Japanese  felt,  too, 


150         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

that  delay  in  reestablishing  the  Chinese  government  in 
Peking  was  enabling  the  Russians  to  fasten  their  grasp  on 
Manchuria.  They  were  wild  with  apprehension  over  the 
news  from  this  province,  where  the  Russians  had  taken 
advantage  of  the  Boxer  troubles  to  bring  in  large  forces, 
attack  the  Chinese  troops,  and  intrench  themselves  in  Muk- 
den, looting  the  palace  and  massacring  civilian  Chinese. 
All  the  powers  were  afraid  that  Germany  would  seize  the 
opportunity  to  extend  her  influence  from  Shantung  into 
Chih-U. 

These  jealousies  made  acceptable  the  proposal  of  the 
empress-dowager,  through  Li  Hung  Chang,  to  conclude 
peace  on  the  basis  of  an  indemnity  and  reaffirmation  or 
modification  of  old  commercial  treaties  in  return  for  the 
cessation  of  military  operations  and  the  withdrawal  of 
foreign  troops.  Despite  the  insistence  of  Russia  and 
Japan,  the  other  powers  refused  to  agree  to  evacuate 
Peking  and  Tientsin  until  peace  was  signed.  On  the  con- 
trary, they  reinforced  their  contingents  so  that  not  all  of 
the  cards  should  be  in  the  hands  of  these  two  nations. 

Several  months  were  spent  in  debate,  and  finally,  on 
December  19,  a  joint  note  was  sent  to  the  Chinese  govern- 
ment setting  forth  the  demands  agreed  upon.  The  stipula- 
tions were :  apology  at  Berlin  by  an  imperial  prince  for  the 
murder  of  the  German  minister;  reparation  to  Japan  for 
the  murder  of  the  chancellor  of  her  legation;  punishment 
of  Princes  Tuan  and  Chuang,  and  of  other  instigators  and 
leaders  of  the  Boxers ;  erection  of  expiatory  monuments  in 
foreign  cemeteries  where  tombs  had  been  desecrated;  per- 
mission to  maintain  permanent  legation  guards  at  Peking ; 
razing  of  forts  at  Taku  and  between  Peking  and  the  sea, 
and  military  occupation  by  international  troops  of  the 
Tientsin-Peking  railway  line;  assurance  that  provincial 
governors  would  be  held  personally  responsible  for  viola- 
tion of  the  treaty  and  for  future  anti-foreign  outbreaks; 
revision  of  commercial  treaties;  reform  of  the  palace  sys- 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        151 

tern  of  government  at  Peking;  modification  of  court  cere- 
monial for  the  reception  of  foreign  ministers ;  and  payment 
of  indemnities  to  governments,  corporations,  missionary 
bodies,  and  individuals. 

The  peace  protocol  was  signed  at  Peking  on  January 
14,  1901.  But  when  the  conference  began  between  the  for- 
eign ministers  and  the  government  to  arrange  for  putting 
the  terms  into  effect,  Li  Hung  Chang  realized  the  lack  of 
agreement  among  the  powers.  There  was  no  solidarity  in 
the  negotiations.  In  private  interviews  he  was  able  to 
secure  a  betrayal  of  the  general  interest  of  all  by  making 
an  appeal  to  the  special  interests  of  each.  Russia  was  will- 
ing to  encourage  Chinese  resistance  to  the  punishment 
clause  in  return  for  additional  advantages  in  the  Manchu- 
rian  treaty  that  she  was  then  negotiating  at  Peking.  Other 
powers,  also,  gave  secret  instructions  to  their  ministers  not 
to  press  claims  for  punishment  too  vigorously.  Political 
and  commercial  considerations  prevented  insistence  upon 
measures  that  would  have  been  constructively  helpful  to 
China  and  that  would  have  helped  her  to  profit  by  the  lesson 
of  the  Boxer  Rebellion. 

On  the  other  hand,  all  the  powers  except  the  United 
States  were  united  in  demanding  exaggerated  indemnities. 
By  becoming  creditors  of  the  Chinese  government  they 
hoped  to  gain  further  economic  advantages  and  to  have 
means  of  keeping  the  country  in  tutelage.  China  was  thus 
saddled  with  a  debt  whose  principal,  -svith  interest  at  four 
per  cent.,  amounted  to  nearly  one  and  one  half  billion  dol- 
lars. The  amortization  was  to  be  completed  in  forty  years. 
The  legation  compounds  in  Peking  were  united  and  sur- 
rounded by  a  loopholed  wall,  and  China  had  to  agree  to  the 
permanent  maintenance  of  this  fortress  by  legation  guards. 
On  September  17,  1901,  Peking  was  evacuated.  The  court 
returned  on  January  7,  1902. 

While  the  negotiations  were  in  progress  Great  Britain 
and  Germany  signed  an  agreement  to  observe  a  common 


152  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

policy  in  China.  They  promised  to  sustain  the  open  door 
in  every  part  of  China  where  they  exercised  power,  and 
not  to  "make  use  of  the  present  complication"  to  obtain 
for  themselves  territorial  advantages.  But  they  agreed 
that  in  case  another  powder  obtained  territorial  advantages 
as  a  result  of  the  Boxer  Rebellion  they  would  ''come  to  a 
preliminary  understanding  as  to  steps  w^hich  may  have  to 
be  taken  for  the  protection  of  their  o^\ni  interests  in  China." 

The  participation  of  Germany  in  suppressing  the  Boxers 
received  more  attention  from  the  world  than  its  importance 
warranted.  The  murder  of  Baron  von  Ketteler  was  ample 
justification  for  Germany's  particular  interest  in  the  ex- 
pedition to  Peking.  But  Germany  had  only  a  handful  of 
soldiers  available,  and  the  appointment  of  Field  Marshal 
Count  von  Waldersee  to  command  the  international  army 
was  due,  not  to  German  pressure  or  intrigue,  but  to  the 
hopeless  jealousy  among  British  and  Russians  and  Japa- 
nese. Japanese  and  Russians  vetoed  each  other,  and  the 
British  were  heavily  involved  in  the  Boer  War.  Unable 
to  send  many  troops  and  fearful  of  a  Russian  or  Japanese 
occupation  of  Peking,  the  British  government  suggested 
the  appointment  of  a  German  in  the  hope  that  the  kaiser 
would  send  a  large  force.  He  did.  By  the  end  of  Novem- 
ber Germany  had  twenty  thousand  men  in  China.  The 
official  statement  issued  by  the  German  government  was 
dignified  and  reserved.  It  was  declared  that  the  army  to 
be  sent  to  China  would  be  composed  entirely  of  volunteers, 
that  the  purpose  was  to  rescue  Europeans  in  Peking  and 
exact  retribution  for  the  murder  of  Baron  von  Ketteler  and 
other  atrocities,  but  that  the  partition  of  China  was  against 
German  policy.  It  was  the  kaiser  whose  theatrical  pro- 
nouncements discredited  the  German  effort.  He  never  lived 
down  the  speech  in  which  he  expatiated  upon  Attila  and 
the  Huns. 

On  March  15, 1901,  Chancellor  von  Biilow  told  the  Reichs- 
tag that  some  powers  pursued  commercial  interests  and 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        153 

other  powers  played  politics  in  China.  Germany,  he  de- 
clared, was  in  the  first  category,  and  for  this  reason  the 
Anglo-German  agreement  had  been  signed  with  the  hope 
of  maintaining  the  integrity  of  China  as  long  as  possible. 
The  wording  of  the  agreement  showed  that  it  had  no  refer- 
ence to  Manchuria,  where  there  were  no  German  interests 
worth  mentioning.  "As  regards  the  future  of  Manchuria, 
really,  gentlemen,  I  can  imagine  nothing  which  we  regard 
with  more  indifference.  But  it  is  our  interest  to  see,  in 
close  cooperation  Avith  other  powers,  that  China  does  not 
unduly  diminish  her  resources  until  her  debts  are  paid." 
The  words  of  the  German  chancellor  sum  up  tersely  the 
cynical  attitude  of  European  statesmen  towards  China. 

Liberal  circles  in  Great  Britain  felt  during  the  siege  of 
the  legations  that  the  delay  in  going  to  the  relief  of  Euro- 
peans in  Peking  was  due  to  the  unwillingness  of  the  other 
powers  to  allow  the  Japanese  or  the  Russians  to  save  the 
day.  Clearly  the  risk  was  run  of  sacrificing  helpless 
women  and  children  to  diplomatic  considerations.  The  full 
extent  ©f  the  immorality  and  lack  of  chivalry  of  interna- 
tional diplomacy  was  demonstrated  when  Indian  troops, 
who  had  been  despatched  to  protect  foreigners  in  Shanghai, 
had  to  stay  on  their  ships  until  a  certain  proportion  of 
French  and  German  troops  landed. 

The  tendency  to  lay  the  blame  for  the  Boxer  uprising  at 
the  door  of  Germany  because  she  had  seized  Kiau-chau, 
and  thus  to  exculpate  the  imperialism  of  the  other  powers, 
did  not  enter  into  the  minds  of  the  statesmen  of  the  day. 
Speaking  in  Parliament  on  August  2,  Sir  Ed^vard  Grey 
declared  that  ''the  idea  that  China  was  ripe  for  partition 
and  that  any  liberty  could  be  taken  with  her  was  the  main 
fault  of  the  present  trouble."  Mr.  Broderick  follow^ed 
with  a  high  tribute  to  Count  von  Waldersee.  He  said  that 
England's  interests  were  often  found  to  be  running  side 
by  side  with  those  of  Germany,  that  the  government  wel- 
comed German  intervention,  and  that  he  hoped  that  ''as 


154         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

good  comrades,  Germany  and  England  might  advance  to- 
gether again,  certainly  to  victory,  and,  let  us  all  trust,  also 
towards  the  strengthening  of  the  ties  between  that  great 
nation  and  ourselves." 

Not  content  with  permission  to  construct  the  Trans- 
Siberian  Railway  across  Manchuria,  or  even  with  economic 
and  political  control  of  the  portion  of  Manchuria  through 
which  the  railway  ran,  Russia  wanted  all  Manchuria  and 
the  Korean  and  Liao-tung  peninsulas.  By  secret  negotia- 
tions with  Li  Hung  Chang,  Russia  secured — in  addition  to 
the  railway  from  Mukden  to  the  tip  of  the  Liao-tung  penin- 
sula and  the  Port  Arthur  and  Dalny  concessions — land  for 
a  settlement  at  Tientsin,  on  the  left  bank  of  the  river 
Pei-ho,  opposite  the  British  concession.  This  led  to  simi- 
lar demands  from  the  other  powers,  and  Tientsin,  the  port 
of  Peking,  presently  became  a  center  of  international 
rivalry,  with  the  powers  fighting  for  lands  and  whai'ves 
with  complete  disregard  of  Chinese  sovereignty. 

Instead  of  withdrawing  her  troops  from  southern  Man- 
churia and  the  province  of  Chih-li,  Russia,  through  Li  Hung 
Chang,  tried  in  1901  to  negotiate  a  separate  treaty  with 
China.  Some  of  the  powerful  mandarins,  backed  by  pub- 
lic opinion  in  Peking  and  encouraged  more  or  less  openly 
by  Great  Britain  and  Japan,  opposed  the  Russian  demand, 
whereupon  Russia  presented  the  proposed  treaty  as  an 
ultimatum,  with  a  date  fixed  before  which  the  terms  must 
be  accepted. 

The  demands  were  as  follows:  civil  administration  in 
Manchuria  to  be  restored  to  China,  but  China  to  accept 
the  assistance  of  Russia  in  keeping  order,  and  Russia  to 
maintain  a  military  force  for  the  protection  of  the  Man- 
churian  Railway ;  no  munitions  of  war  to  be  imported  and 
no  military  force  to  be  kept  in  Manchuria  without  Russia's 
consent;  no  foreigners  except  Russians  to  be  employed  in 
organizing  land  and  sea  forces  in  north  China;  Chinese 
officials  in  Manchuria  and  Liao-tung  who  should  prove  ob- 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)         155 

noxious  to  Russia  to  be  dismissed ;  the  district  of  Kin-chau, 
at  the  northern  end  of  the  Liao-tung  Gulf,  to  pass  under 
Russian  administration;  no  mining  or  railway  concessions 
to  be  granted  to  foreigners  in  Manchuria,  Mongolia,  or 
Turkestan;  indemnity  for  injury  to  Russian  interests  and 
for  Russian  expenses  in  Manchuria  arising  from  the  Boxer 
troubles ;  the  damage  caused  to  the  Manchurian  Railway  to 
be  compensated  by  a  new  concession  or  modification  of  the 
old  one ;  and  a  Russian  railway  connecting  the  Manchurian 
Railway  with  the  Great  Wall.  These  arrangements  were 
tantamount  to  Russian  control  from  Petrograd  to  Peking. 

At  first,  China  resisted;  and  after  the  protocol  to  settle 
the  Boxer  atfair  had  been  signed  Russia  presented  a  new 
project  very  similar  to  the  ultimatum.  At  this  juncture 
Li  Hung  Chang  died.  But  the  Russian  troops  remained  in 
Manchuria,  and  Russia  was  in  a  position  to  exercise  the 
rights  that  China  refused  to  grant.  The  Trans-Siberian 
Railway  was  completed  in  November,  and  the  Russians  pre- 
pared Da]ny  as  the  terminus  of  the  Liao-tung  branch.  In 
defiance  of  China  and  the  powers  and  in  violation  of  their 
rights,  the  Russians  also  remained  in  occupation  of  the 
treaty  port  of  Niuchuang. 

In  January,  1902,  Great  Britain  and  Japan  informed 
China  that  they  would  not  assent  to  the  concession  of  ex- 
clusive rights  to  Russians  in  Manchuria ;  and  several  weeks 
later  the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance,  which  promised  the  in- 
tegrity and  independence  of  China  and  equal  trade  oppor- 
tunities for  all,  was  made  known  to  the  world.  The  United 
States  also  protested  vigorously  at  Petrograd  and  Peking, 
and  was  assured  that  equal  commercial  rights  would  be 
maintained  within  the  '' Russian  zone."  The  same  assur- 
ance was  given  to  Great  Britain  and  Japan.  France  did 
not  ask  for  it;  nor  did  Germany.  It  was  no  secret  that 
French  capitalists  expected  to  draw  the  biggest  portion  of 
the  profit  from  Russian  exploitations  in  Manchuria.  And 
Germany  intended  to  watch  closely  every  step  in  Russian 


156         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

encroachment.  Any  additional  privilege  granted  to  Eus- 
sia  in  Manchuria  would  be  regarded  as  an  excuse  for 
demanding  the  same  privilege  in  Shantung. 

A  Russo-Chinese  agreement  was  signed  on  April  8,  1902. 
Russia  promised  to  withdraw  her  troops  from  Manchuria 
within  eighteen  months,  to  restore  the  entire  Manchurian 
Railway  to  China,  to  intrust  the  guarding  of  the  railway 
to  Chinese  troops,  and  to  consider  Manchuria  as  "an  in- 
tegral portion  of  the  Chinese  Empire. "  On  the  other  hand, 
China  was  to  put  the  executive  control  of  the  railway  into 
Russian  hands,  and  to  grant  no  concessions  for  other  rail- 
way construction  in  Manchuria  without  the  consent  of  Rus- 
sia. This  was  what  the  world  at  first  knew.  Russia  had 
also  asked  for  secret  clauses,  accompanying  the  agreement, 
by  which  China  would  grant  exclusive  railway  and  mining 
exploitation  in  Manchuria  to  the  Russo-Chinese  Bank.  But 
these  clauses  were  discovered  by  the  other  powders,  and  the 
convention  was  signed  without  them. 

The  railway  to  the  tip  of  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  was 
completed  at  the  end  of  July,  1903.  But  during  its  con- 
struction Russia  made  excuses  for  faihng  to  withdraw 
troops  from  Manchuria,  and  tried  to  get  China  to  agree 
to  their  retention  and  also  to  close  Manchuria,  including 
Liao-tung,  to  foreign  trade  other  than  Russian.  Instead  of 
evacuating  Manchuria  on  October  8  (the  limit  of  the  period 
allowed),  she  held  military  and  naval  manceuvers  at  Port 
Arthur,  and  on  October  28  reoccupied  Mukden  wdth  strong 
forces.  Admiral  Alexieff  gave  the  excuse  that  Russia  had 
found  it  impossible  to  "extend  civilization  in  Manchuria" 
without  administering  the  country.  At  the  same  time 
reports  reached  the  outside  world  that  the  Russians  had 
erected  forts  in  northern  Mongolia  and  were  sending  their 
agents,  commercial  and  political,  into  that  province.  Rus- 
sian engineers  were  also  surveying  a  railway  route  there. 

Once  more,  as  at  the  time  of  the  Russian  menace  to 
Korea,  China  was  at  the  parting  of  the  ways.    Yuan-Shih- 


ATTEMPT  TO  PARTITION  CHINA  (1895-1902)        157 

Kai,  who  came  to  the  front  as  new  commander-in-chief  of 
the  Chinese  army,  declared  for  a  policy  of  rapprochement 
with  Japan.  He  tried  to  get  Peking  to  see  that  Russia 
might  fight  for  Manchuria.  By  declaring  war  on  Russia 
and  inviting  the  cooperation  of  Japan,  China  could  antici- 
pate Japanese  action  and  save  Manchuria  and  the  Liao- 
tung  peninsula.  Yuan-Shih-Kai  was  not  listened  to.  Eu- 
ropean representatives  at  Peking,  while  opposing  Russia 
and  each  other,  worked  against  an  agreement  between  the 
two  Oriental  states. 

The  result  of  failure  to  follow  Yuan-Shih-Kai 's  advice 
has  been  constant  antagonism  between  China  and  Japan, 
whose  real  interests  on  the  eve  of  the  Russo-Japanese  War 
were  identical.  Chinese  statesmen  failed  to  see  that  by 
siding  with  Japan  China  might  have  defended  her  terri- 
torial integrity  and  her  sovereignty  against  all  foreign  en- 
croachment. While  Japan  engaged  in  a  life-and-death 
struggle  with  Russia,  China  remained  neutral,  suffering 
the  ignominy  of  neutrality  with  all  the  inconveniences  of 
belligerency.  In  Manchuria  the  inhabitants  saw  their 
homes  destroyed,  their  possessions  subjected  to  requisition, 
and  civilians  forced  to  work  for  both  armies.  Japanese 
and  Russians  lived  on  the  countiy,  and  finally  made  peace 
with  each  other,  disregarding  China  and  dividing  between 
themselves  one  of  her  largest  and  richest  provinces. 


CHAPTER  XII 

JAPAN'S  SECOND  CHALLENGE  TO  EUROPE:  THE  WAR 
WITH  RUSSIA   (1904-1905) 

HAD  Russia  limited  her  activity  in  the  Far  East  to 
Manchuria,  Japan  probably  would  have  waited 
longer  to  issue  her  second  challenge  to  Europe.  For  the 
long  lease  of  Port  Arthur  and  the  concession  to  connect 
the  main  line  of  the  Manchurian  Railway  with  the  Liao- 
tung  peninsula  were  Russia's  share  in  the  partition  of 
China  agreed  upon  by  four  European  powers.  Japan  could 
not  fight  them  all,  and  Russian  aggression,  if  it  had  stopped 
in  Manchuria,  could  hardly  have  been  regarded  by  Japan 
as  more  menacing  than  that  of  the  other  powers.  Although 
the  fortification  of  Port  Arthur  was  a  direct  challenge  to 
Japan,  the  Japanese  saw  that  the  European  powers,  who 
had  united  to  prevent  them  from  getting  a  foothold  in 
China,  were  not  effectively  opposing  the  ambitions  of  Rus- 
sia. Even  Great  Britain,  Japan's  new  ally,  had  recently 
entered  into  a  spheres-of-influence  agreement  with  Russia, 
leaving  to  the  Russians  all  of  China  north  of  the  Great 
v\rall. 

But  when  Russia,  after  completing  the  Trans-Siberian 
Railway,  made  a  settlement  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Yalu 
River,  in  Korean  territory,  and  secured  a  concession  from 
Korea  for  a  naval  base  at  Masan-pho,  a  port  opposite 
Japan,  the  Japanese  had  to  choose  between  fighting  Russia 
or  allowing  Russia  to  become  the  dominant  power  in  the 
Far  East.  The  second  alternative  was  never  entertained 
for  a  moment.  During  the  decade  that  followed  the  war 
mth  China,  the  Japanese  strained  every  nerve  in  prepar- 
ing to  expel  Russia  from  China,  Manchuria,  and  Korea. 

158 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  RUSSIA  (1904-1905)  159 

They  consented  to  stupendous  financial  sacrifices  to  build 
up  their  army  and  navy.  In  realizing  that  military 
strength  could  not  be  developed  apart  from  industrial  and 
commercial  growth,  they  followed  the  example  of  Germany. 

In  June,  1903,  General  Kuropatkin,  Russian  minister  of 
war,  visited  Tokio  as  the  guest  of  the  emperor.  He  was 
given  a  friendly  reception.  Japanese  statesmen  insisted 
strongly  upon  the  desire  of  Japan  to  prevent  war.  The 
tone  of  the  Russian  press,  also,  was  moderate  and  friendly. 
But  while  the  Russians  were  prodigal  "with  assurances  of 
admiration  and  friendship  for  Japan,  words  were  not  trans- 
lated into  actions.  Russia  continued  to  occupy  Phyong-an 
Do  on  the  Korean  side  of  the  Yalu  River,  to  fortify  Port 
Arthur,  and  to  build  up  a  Pacific  fleet.  The  encroachments 
upon  Chinese  sovereignty  in  Manchuria  and  the  provinces 
north  of  Peking  were  more  alarming  than  ever. 

On  August  12,  1903,  the  Japanese  ambassador  at  Petro- 
grad  presented  a  proposal  for  arranging  the  mutual  inter- 
ests of  Russia. and  Japan  in  Manchuria  and  Korea.  The 
Japanese  demanded  the  fulfilment  of  the  agreement  Russia 
had  signed  with  Japan  in  1898,  by  which  both  powers 
recognized  Korea's  independence.  But  at  the  same  time 
Japan  desired  Russia  to  recognize  the  Japanese  agreement 
mth  Korea  of  the  same  year,  which  granted  Japan  prefer- 
ential rights  for  railway  construction.  For  several  months 
there  was  a  deadlock  in  the  negotiations.  A  conference 
was  held  in  Tokio  in  October  between  the  members  of  the 
Japanese  cabinet  and  the  Elder  Statesmen.  The  latter 
urged  the  cabinet  to  make  all  possible  concessions  to 
Russia. 

But  public  opinion  in  Japan  was  thoroughly  aroused. 
It  was  felt  that  an  indefinite  continuation  of  negotia- 
tions would  simply  mean  allowing  Russia  more  time  to 
strengthen  her  naval  and  military  position  in  Liao-tung  and 
Manchuria.  The  proposal  of  the  Elder  Statesmen  that 
Japan  limit  her  demands  to  a  pledge  from  Russia  to  respect 


160         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

both  the  sovereignty  and  the  integrity  of  China  and  Korea 
was  considered  as  a  makeshift  to  put  off  the  evil  day.  The 
Japanese  cabinet  summoned  Russia  to  recognize  the  inde- 
pendence and  integrity  of  the  Chinese  and  Korean  empires ; 
to  admit  Japan's  special  interests  in  Korea  in  return  for 
Japan's  admission  of  Russia's  special  interests  in  Man- 
churia; and  the  mutual  declaration  of  equality  of  oppor- 
tunity for  Russia  and  Japan  in  concessions  and  trade  in 
both  Manchuria  and  Korea.  November  passed  mthout 
an  answer  from  Russia. 

On  December  5  the  Japanese  diet  met  and  voted  con- 
fidence in  the  cabinet  only  with  the  stipulation  that  imme- 
diate action  be  taken.  The  emperor  addressed  the  diet  in 
person  on  December  10,  declaring  that  his  ministers  had 
shown  prudence  and  circumspection  in  the  negotiations  to 
protect  the  rights  and  interests  of  Japan.  The  diet  unani- 
mously replied  that  the  cabinet  was  temporizing  at  home 
and  neglecting  opportunities  abroad.  The  emperor  dis- 
solved the  diet.  It  could  not  be  concealed,  however,  that 
Russia  had  sent  an  unsatisfactory  reply  and  that  the  Rus- 
sian military  authorities  were  pouring  troops  into  Man- 
churia. The  Japanese  press  called  upon  the  government 
to  declare  war. 

On  December  21  Russia  was  asked  to  reconsider  her 
reply.  The  answer,  received  on  January  6,  demanded 
recognition  by  Japan  of  Manchuria  and  the  Liao-tung 
peninsula  as  outside  the  Japanese  sphere  of  interest,  and 
consented  not  to  interfere  with  the  enjoyment  by  Japan 
and  other  powers  of  treaty  rights  acquired  mthin  Man- 
churia. The  establishment  of  foreign  settlements  in  the 
province  was,  however,  excepted ;  and  Japan  was  informed 
that  if  a  neutral  zone  were  established,  it  must  be  on  the 
Korean  side  of  the  Yalu  River  alone,  and  that  Japan  must 
promise  to  refrain  from  using  any  part  of  Korea  for 
strategic  purposes.  With  the  single  modification  that  she 
was  willing  to  pledge  herself  not  to  act  in  advance  of  any 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  RUSSIA  (1904-1905)  161 

other  power  in  regard  to  settlements  in  Manchuria,  Japan 
rejected  the  Russian  proposals.  Japanese  statesmen  may- 
have  hoped  for  a  further  reply  and  new  proposals  from 
Russia.  If  they  did,  they  were  disappointed.  On  the  other 
hand,  Russian  statesmen  did  not  seem  to  regard  their 
silence  as  making  war  inevitable.  They  affected  astonish- 
ment in  Petrograd  when,  on  February  6,  the  Japanese  min- 
ister demanded  his  passports. 

A  Russian  official  communique,  given  to  the  press  on 
February  9,  also  asserted  the  surprise  of  the  Russian  gov- 
eniment  at  the  events  immediately  follo^^ing  the  breaking 
off  of  diplomatic  relations  by  Japan.  The  Russians  tried 
to  make  it  seem  that  they  had  no  intention  of  entering  into 
war  with  Japan,  and  that  Japan  was  the  aggressor.  The 
Russian  note  said  that  the  army  in  Manchuria  numbered 
barely  one  hundred  thousand.  But  a  nation  pursuing  an 
imperialistic  policy  should  never  be  surprised  if  an- 
other nation  prefers  to  declare  war  rather  than  to  accept 
a  change  of  the  economic  and  political  status  quo  in  terri- 
tories where  th^t  change  affects  security  and  economic 
prosperity. 

The  day  after  the  Japanese  minister  left  Petrograd, 
Admiral  Uriu  appeared  before  the  port  of  Chemulpo  and 
ordered  a  Russian  cruiser  and  a  Russian  gunboat  to  leave 
the  harbor  mthin  twenty-four  hours.  The  commanders 
of  French,  British,  American,  and  Italian  war-ships  in  the 
port  protested,  but  to  no  avail.  By  refusing  to  receive  the 
protest,  Admiral  Uriu  signified  to  the  powers  the  disap- 
pearance of  the  last  vestige  of  their  tutelage  over  Japan. 
A  new  '* great  power"  had  been  born  in  the  decade  follow- 
ing the  Sino-Japanese  War.  If  Europe  and  America 
needed  a  demonstration  of  this  unpalatable  fact,  they  were 
not  to  wait  long.  The  two  Russian  war-ships  made  an 
attempt  to  escape.  Not  succeeding,  they  returned  towards 
the  port  and  sank  themselves  in  shallow  water.  On  the 
same  day  the  main  Japanese  fleet  attacked  the  Russian 


162         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

fleet  outside  the  harbor  of  Port  Arthur,  inflicted  consider- 
able damage,  and  forced  the  Russians  to  withdraw  under 
the  protection  of  the  guns  of  the  fortress.  For  two  months 
Admiral  Togo  kept  the  Russian  fleet  busy  by  repeated  and 
daring  torpedo-boat  attacks.  He  was  unsuccessful,  as  the 
Americans  had  been  at  Santiago,  in  trying  to  bottle  up 
Port  Arthur  by  sinking  ships  at  the  mouth  of  the  channel. 
But  he  kept  firing  into  the  harbor  and  prevented  the  Rus- 
sians from  coming  out.  On  April  13  the  Russians  lost  two 
battle-ships  by  running  into  a  mine-field.  The  Vladivostok 
squadron  had  succeeded  in  making  a  few  raids  in  the  Japan 
Sea,  but  failed  to  interrupt  the  transport  of  the  Japanese 
army  into  Korea. 

The  Japanese  navy  controlled  the  sea  absolutely  through- 
out the  war.  Russia  attempted  only  once  to  challenge  this 
control,  which  made  possible  the  use  of  the  Korean  penin- 
sula as  a  base  for  attacking  the  Russians  in  Manchuria. 
The  Russian  fleets  in  the  Baltic  and  Black  seas,  comprising 
thirty-six  vessels,  were  sent  out  to  the  Far  East  in  the 
early  spring  of  1905.     The  Japanese  annihilated  them. 

In  the  meantime,  by  brilliant  campaigning  the  three 
Japanese  armies  defeated  the  superior  Russian  forces  in 
the  Shengking  Province,  northwest  of  Korea.  Port  Arthur 
was  captured  after  heroic  assaults  on  January  1,  1905. 
In  March  the  Russian  army  met  disaster  in  the  battle  of 
Mukden,  largely  through  the  skilful  use  by  the  Japanese  of 
their  artillery.  So  signal  was  the  defeat  that  the  Japanese 
might  easily  have  captured  the  entire  Russian  forces,  had 
they  not  themselves  been  exhausted  after  three  weeks  of 
continuous  marching  and  fighting.  These  victories,  fol- 
lowed by  the  total  destruction  of  Russian  sea  power,  raised 
the  morale  of  both  civilian  and  military  Japan  to  the  high- 
est pitch. 

But  the  Japanese  were  not  in  an  enviable  position  for 
forcing  the  end  of  the  war  on  land.  They  captured  the 
island  of  Sakhalin  in  July  and  sent  two  armies  to  invest 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  RUSSIA  (1904-1905)  163 

Vladivostok.  Further  military  operations  might,  indeed, 
have  led  to  a  second  Mukden.  But  would  it  have  been 
worth  while  to  make  a  new  effort  in  Manchuria  without  the 
certainty  of  winning  a  decision?  The  fall  of  Vladivostok 
might  have  proved  as  indecisive,  from  a  strategical  point  of 
view,  as  the  fall  of  Port  Arthur.  Japan  controlled  the 
sea.  The  capture  of  another  seaport  would  not  have 
brought  the  Russians  to  the  point  of  capitulation.  Even 
if  they  were  driven  out  of  Manchuria  and  the  maritime 
province  as  well,  the  Russian  armies  would  still  have  been 
a  menace.  The  fact  that  Russia's  lines  of  communication 
were  direct  lines  by  land,  over  her  own  territory,  has  al- 
ways had  to  be  faced  by  the  Japanese,  in  peace  as  in  war. 
The  Russian  government,  on  the  other  hand,  did  not  want 
to  risk  losing  Vladivostok  and  the  entire  maritime  province, 
when  there  was  little  hope  of  turning  the  fortune  of  arms 
in  Manchuria.  Petrograd  was  also  on  the  verge  of  an  in- 
ternal revolution. 

As  both  sides  were  in  a  mood  for  peace,  and  were  willing 
to  compromise  rather  than  continue  a  costly  war  in  which 
further  advantages  for  Japan  or  retrieving  of  fortunes 
for  Russia  seemed  improbable,  an  overture  of  mediation 
from  President  Roosevelt  met  with  success.  Fighting  in 
Manchuria  ceased  at  the  beginning  of  summer,  and  on 
August  9  the  Japanese  and  Russian  plenipotentiaries  met 
at  Portsmouth,  New  Hampshire.  Among  their  stipula- 
tions, the  Japanese  demanded  a  pecuniary  indemnity  and 
the  cession  of  Sakhalin — two  points  on  which  the  Russian 
plenipotentiaries  did  not  have  power  to  yield.  After  a 
fortnight  of  debate,  during  which  all  the  other  conditions 
were  agreed  upon,  Russia  consented  to  compromise  by  ced- 
ing the  southern  half  of  Sakhalin,  while  Japan  waived 
her  claim  to  an  indemnity.  The  treaty  of  Portsmouth, 
signed  on  September  5,  was  ratified  in  October  by  both 
countries. 

In  the  treaty  Russia  recognized  Japan's  paramount  in- 


164  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

terests  in  Korea;  transferred  to  Japan  her  lease  of  Port 
Arthur  and  all  concessions,  establishments,  and  railway 
and  mining  rights  in  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  and  southern 
Manchuria;  ceded  the  southern  half  of  Sakhalin;  and 
granted  fishing  rights  to  the  Japanese  in  the  Pacific  waters 
of  Russia.  There  was  a  reciprocal  undertaking  to  evacu- 
ate Manchuria  and  restore  to  China  sovereign  rights 
throughout  the  province;  also  to  give  up  prisoners  and 
pay  the  expenses  of  their  maintenance  during  the  war.  An 
additional  provision  regulated  the  strength  of  the  military 
forces  Russia  and  Japan  were  to  keep  in  Manchuria  to 
protect  the  railways  and  other  concessions. 

When  the  terms  of  the  treaty  were  made  public,  the 
Japanese  people,  who  naturally  considered  themselves  the 
victors  in  the  war,  were  deeply  disappointed.  Riots  broke 
out  in  Tokio  and  elsewhere.  In  particular,  the  people  felt 
that  the  waiving  of  an  indemnity  was  putting  upon  them 
the  financial  burden  of  a  war  they  had  not  sought.  They 
did  not  see  why  Russia  should  be  allowed  to  retain  any 
interests  in  Manchuria  and  be  left  in  undisturbed  posses- 
sion, without  restrictions,  of  Vladivostok. 

It  soon  came  to  be  admitted,  however,  that  the  prolonga- 
tion of  the  war  for  the  sake  of  an  indemnity  might  have 
meant  throwing  good  money  after  bad.  As  for  Sakhalin, 
Vladivostok,  and  northern  Manchuria,  the  compromise  led 
to  the  establishment  of  friendly  relations  with  Russia.  In 
the  minds  of  Japanese  statesmen  there  was  no  longer  rea- 
son for  fearing  Russia  or  considering  Russia  an  enemy 
after  that  power  had  been  expelled  from  Korea  and 
the  Liao-tung  peninsula  and  had  agreed  to  divide  Man- 
churia. 

The  moderation  shown  by  the  Japanese  at  Portsmouth 
was  as  good  politics  as  was  their  forbearance  during  the 
negotiations  preceding  the  war.  In  the  fulfilment  of  the 
aspiration  of  Japan  to  be  the  dominant  power  in  the  Far 
East,  the  expulsion  of  Russia  from  Korea  and  the  sea-coast 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  RUSSIA  (1904-1905)  165 

of  China  was  the  first  point  gained.  None  could  deny  the 
legitimacy  of  the  aspiration — if  Japan  were  going  to  use 
her  power  to  protect  other  Asiatic  nations  against  Europe, 
as  the  United  States  was  doing  in  maintaining  the  Monroe 
Doctrine  on  behalf  of  other  American  nations.  Japan 
would  recover  from  the  strain  of  1904  and  1905,  and  would 
again  feel  herself  strong  enough  to  hold  her  own  against 
Europe.  Then,  at  the  first  good  opportunity,  would  come 
the  turn  of  the  European  powers  to  be  ousted  from  China. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902) 

THE  expansion  of  Great  Britain  has  not  been  accom- 
plished without  bitter  opposition  on  the  part  of  a 
considerable  element  in  the  British  electorate.  More  than 
once  a  general  election  has  been  influenced  by  the  polemics 
of  the  Little  Englander  group  of  thinkers  and  politicians. 
Gladstone  and  many  of  his  Liberal  supporters  were  avowed 
anti-imperialists.  And  yet,  Liberal  governments  did  not, 
on  coming  into  power,  discard  the  foreign  policies  they 
had  attacked  when  out  of  office.  We  have  already  seen  how 
during  Gladstone's  second  premiership  (1880-85)  Egypt 
was  occupied.  North  Borneo  acquired,  the  British  New 
Guinea  Company  formed,  and  protectorates  proclaimed 
over  vast  territories  in  different  parts  of  Africa.^  Glad- 
stone returned  to  power  for  a  few  months  in  1886,  and  for 
a  fourth  time  from  1892  to  1894.  In  the  intervals  Lord 
Salisbury  was  premier.  The  Liberal  government  did  not 
fall  for  more  than  a  year  after  Gladstone 's  last  resignation. 
In  the  summer  of  1895  Lord  Salisbury  formed  his  third 
cabinet,  and  he  directed  the  destinies  of  the  British  Empire 
throughout  the  period  under  survey. 

During  the  decade  of  Liberal  and  Conservative  ins  and 
outs  (1885-95)  the  Irish  question  and  other  domestic 
policies  had  held  the  floor.  Public  opinion  was  indifferent, 
if  not  actually  hostile,  to  imperialism.  The  Conservative 
party  was  changing  and  the  Liberal  party  was  being  dis- 
rupted under  influences  and  because  of  issues  other  than 
those  that  had  ordinarily  divided  sharply  the  followers  of 
Gladstone  and  the  followers  of  Disraeli.    For  all  that,  the 

^See  pp.  69,  78-79,  89-95. 

166 


REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)    167 

empire  did  not  cease  to  grow.  Protectorates  were  estab- 
lished over  the  Niger  coast,  Zanzibar,  Pemba,  and  Uganda ; 
while  in  India  Sikkim  was  acquired,  and  in  the  Indian 
Ocean  and  the  Pacific,  Sokotra,  Sarawak,  British  New 
Guinea,  and  the  Solomon  and  Gilbert  Islands  were  brought 
under  the  British  crown.  The  nation,  however,  knew  little 
or  nothing  of  these  additions  to  the  empire,  and  as  none  of 
them  involved  the  country  either  in  a  conflict  with  any  other 
great  power  or  in  a  colonial  war,  the  Foreign  Office  was  not 
called  upon  to  submit  its  activities  to  the  approval  or  dis- 
approval of  Parliament.  It  is  only  when  foreign  policies, 
which  for  years  may  have  passed  unobserved,  begin  to 
demand  large  financial  appropriations  or  have  led  to  trou- 
ble that  the  people  are  aware  of  the  responsibilities  as- 
sumed in  their  name. 

The  third  Salisbury  ministry  marked  the  full  and  final 
coalition  of  the  Conservative  and  Liberal  Unionist  parties. 
The  leader  of  the  latter  party,  Joseph  Chamberlain,  became 
Lord  Salisbury's  colonial  secretary.  Long  before  the  split 
between  Gladstone  and  Chamberlain,  Gladstone  had  spoken 
of  his  president  of  the  Board  of  Trade  (this  was  the  port- 
folio held  by  Chamberlain  in  the  second  Gladstone  min- 
istry) as  his  only  jingo  member.  Chamberlain  believed  in 
the  imperial  destiny  of  Great  Britain,  and  became  a  power- 
ful influence  in  shaping  foreign  policies  aggressively  at  a 
time  when  many  statesmen  and  publicists  believed  that  the 
honor  and  interests  of  Great  Britain  demanded  casting  off 
some  of  the  existing  colonial  burdens  rather  than  assuming 
additional  ones. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  new  ministry  war  was  twice 
narrowly  averted — with  France  over  Siam  and  with  the 
United  States  over  Venezuela.  For  the  moment  Asia  and 
South  America  held  secondary  places  in  British  foreign 
policy,  whose  immediate  interest  was  the  consolidation  and 
extension  of  the  African  colonies.  The  Siamese  .question 
was  complicated  by  the  fact  that  Russia  and  France  were 


168  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

forming  an  offensive  and  defensive  alliance,  and  Great 
Britain  did  not  relish  a  war  with  two  powers  in  Asia  simul- 
taneously with  the  development  of  a  crisis  in  South  Africa. 
And  it  was  not  good  statesmanship  to  come  to  blows  with 
the  United  States  over  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  the  mainte- 
nance of  which  was  far  from  disadvantageous  to  British 
interests  in  America.^ 

It  is  impossible  to  present  within  brief  compass  a  clear 
picture  of  the  revival  of  British  imperialism  under  the 
third  Salisbury  cabinet  by  following  chronologically  the 
military  and  diplomatic  moves  by  which  Great  Britain  out- 
distanced her  rivals.  We  must,  therefore,  consider  succes- 
sively the  Far  East,  west  Africa,  the  Sudan,  and  south 
Africa. 

In  the  Far  East  British  encroachment  upon  the  sov- 
ereignty of  China  and  Siam  through  Burma,  and  French 
encroachment  through  Tonkin  and  Anam,  brought  the  two 
European  powers  to  the  verge  of  war.^  Each  feared  that 
the  other  was  going  to  annex  Siam,  and  the  British  were 
afraid  that  the  French,  not  content  with  Tonkin,  would 
attempt  to  annex  the  rich  Chinese  province  of  Yunnan  as 
they  themselves  had  annexed  Burma.  To  avoid  war,  the 
Anglo-French  agreement  of  January  5,  1896,  provided  for 
the  neutralization  of  the  valley  of  the  Menam  and  its  tribu- 
taries and  for  the  recognition  of  territories  to  the  east  as 
French  and  to  the  west  as  British  spheres  of  influence. 

Difficulties  with  France  on  the  southern  frontier  were 
no  sooner  settled  than  Great  Britain  had  to  face  a  new 
situation  arising  in  the  Far  East  through  the  efforts  of 
other  powers  to  gain  naval  bases  and  spheres  of  influence 
in  China  and  to  extend  their  sovereignty  over  Pacific 
islands.  Up  to  this  time  France  and  Eussia  had  been  her 
only  rivals.    But  the  Sino-Japanese  War  gave  Formosa  to 

*See  pp.  341-343. 

»  See  pp.  61-62,  186,  192. 


REVIVAL'  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)      169 

Japan  in  1895,  and  the  Spanish- American  "War  gave  the 
Philippines  to  the  United  States  in  1898.  The  weakening 
of  China  brought.  Russia  into  Manchuria  and  the  Liao-tung 
peninsula  in  1896,  and  Germany  into  the  Shantung  penin- 
sula in  1898.  The  elimination  of  Spain  gave  Germany  the 
Caroline,  Pelew,  and  Marianne  Islands  (with  the  exception 
of  Guam)  in  1899.  At  this  time  British  statesmen  were  not 
greatly  alarmed  at  the  appearance  of  the  United  States  and 
Germany  as  factors  in  Far  Eastern  affairs.  These  two 
powers  had  not  yet  begun  extensive  naval-building  pro- 
grams. But  Russia,  financed  by  France,  was  beginning  to 
construct  a  formidable  navy  and  was  pushing  her  railways 
into  Manchuria,  thus  simultaneously  (as  the  British 
thought)  threatening  the  British  supremacy  on  the  sea  and 
their  privileged  commercial  position  in  China. ^ 

Two  agreements  were  signed  mth  Germany.  By  the 
first,  on  November  14,  1899,  Great  Britain  renounced  all 
rights  over  the  two  largest  Samoan  islands  in  favor  of 
Germany  and  over  the  other  islands  of  the  group  in  favor 
of  the  United  States.  This  agreement,  which  gave  in  ex- 
change the  right  to  Great  Britain  to  annex  the  Tonga 
(Friendly)  Islands,  was  ratified  by  the  United  States  in 
January,  1900.  As  a  warning  to  Russia,  the  British  and 
Germans  signed  an  agreement  on  October  17,  1900,  pledg- 
ing themselves  mutually  to  maintain  the  territorial  integ- 
rity of  China  and  the  ''open  door."  But  this  agreement 
can  be  interpreted  only  as  an  effort  to  cry  quits  when  the 
two  powers  realized  that  further  impairment  of  Chinese 
sovereignty  would  be  to  their  disadvantage.     France  in 

^  On  December  13,  1897,  Eussian  warships  entered  Port  Arthur.  The  lease 
of  territory  to  Russia  on  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  was  the  beginning  of  the 
scramble  for  leases  at  Peking.  It  marked  the  beginning,  also,  of  Great 
Britain 's  huge  naval-building  program,  two  years  before  Kaiser  Wilhehn, 
at  the  launching  of  the  WiUelshach  in  July,  1900,  declared  that  "the  ocean 
is  indispensable  to  German  greatness. "  It  is  clear  to  the  reader  of  the  annual 
parliamentary  debates  over  the  budget  that  when  they  began  their  great  naval 
expansion  in  1898 — and  for  some  years  later — the  British  had  in  mind  Bussia 
and  France  as  the  potential  enemies  of  the  British  Empire. 


170         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Indo-China  and  Russia  in  Siberia  had  bases  from  which  to 
operate  in  their  predatory  diplomatic  activities,  while 
Japan  was  steadily  growing  stronger. 

Great  Britain  and  Germany  were  not  in  a  position  to 
convince  either  China  or  the  other  powers  of  their  good 
faith  in  issuing  this  warning.  For  both  had  participated 
in  the  attempt  to  partition  China,  and  they  were  not  Avill- 
ing  to  listen  to  the  suggestion  of  the  United  States  that  the 
best  way  to  bring  about  peace  in  China  after  the  Boxer 
Rebellion  and  to  help  in  the  rehabilitation  of  China  was  to 
restore  what  they  had  taken  and  to  refrain  from  exacting 
a  heavy  Boxer  indemnity.  British  statesmen  had  not  in- 
tervened at  Peking  to  prevent  the  leasing  of  bases  on  the 
Liao-tung  peninsula  to  Russia  and  on  the  Shantung  penin- 
sula to  Germany.  Instead  of  protesting,  they  demanded 
compensations,  and  forced  China  to  give  to  Great  Britain 
Wei-hai-wei  on  the  Shantung  peninsula  and  a  lease  of 
the  mainland  opposite  Hong-Kong  to  boot.  France  con- 
doned these  depredations  by  compelhng  Peking  to  give  her 
a  lease  at  Kwang-chau  Wan  on  the  Lien-chau  peninsula. 
The  growing  power  of  Russia,  and  especially  the  naval 
bases  of  Port  Arthur  and  Vladivostok,  induced  the  British 
to  encourage  what  they  knew  to  be  the  ambition  of  Japan — 
the  elimination  of  Russian  naval  and  political  power  in  the 
Pacific.  To  this  end  an  alliance  was  signed  on  January 
30,  1902,  which  pledged  Great  Britain  to  come  to  the  aid 
of  Japan  should  France  join  Russia  in  the  event  of  a  war 
between  Japan  and  Russia.^  This  alliance,  which  has  been 
twice  renewed  and  is  still  in  force,  was  invoked  against 
Germany  in  1914.^ 

The  third  Sahsbury  ministry  carried  on  wars  in  west 
Africa,  the  Sudan,  and  south  Africa;  each  of  which  re- 

'  See  p.  136,  footnote. 

'See  p.  318.  The  four -power  pact,  adopted  by  the  British,  Japanese,  French, 
and  American  delegates  at  the  Washington  conference,  is  popularly  supposed 
to  have  superseded  the  alliance,  but  it  has  not  yet  been  definitely  abrogated. 
Both  in  London  and  Tokio  there  is  difference  of  opinion  as  to  the  status  of 
the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance  after  the  ratification  of  the  four-power  pact. 


REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)      171 

suited  in  annexation  of  territories,  consolidation  of  titles 
already  acquired,  administrative  reorganization,  and  a 
sweeping  extension  of  effective  administrative  control. 
Before  1895  Great  Britain  was  only  potentially  the  pre- 
dominating power  in  Africa.  After  1902  she  had  become 
so  in  fact.  The  effort  was  costly  in  human  life  and  treas- 
ure. Had  France  and  Germany  been  on  friendly  terms  it 
could  not  have  been  accomplished  and  would  have  resulted 
in  a  European  war.  But  the  cards  lay  right  for  Great 
Britain  and  she  played  them  well.  Out  of  these  seven 
years  of  almost  constant  fighting  emerged  West  Africa,  the 
Anglo-Eg}^tian  Sudan,  and  the  Union  of  South  Africa. 

"West  Africa  consists  of  four  territories — the  Gambia 
colony  and  protectorate,  the  Sierra  Leone  colony  and  pro- 
tectorate, the  Nigeria  colony  and  protectorate,  the  Gold 
Coast  colony  and  Northern  Territories  protectorates. 
Ashanti,  which  is  technically  a  colony,  is  attached  to  the 
Gold  Coast. ^  Until  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century  the 
boundaries  of  the  colonies  were  not  definitely  established, 
and  the  native  chieftains  of  the  hinterland  acknowledged 
British  suzerainty  not  at  all  or  fitfully.  It  was  only  when 
France  and  Germany  began  to  explore  the  head-waters  of 
rivers  and  to  stake  out  vast  regions  of  the  interior,  which 
had  not  hitherto  been  mapped,  that  Great  Britain  felt  the 
necessity  of  insisting  upon  boundary  conventions.  This 
meant  negotiations  wdth  the  French  and  German  govern- 
ments, and  at  the  same  time  punitive  expeditions  to  secure 
the  submission  of  tribes  over  whom  suzerainty  was  claimed. 

In  regard  to  the  frontiers  of  Gambia  and  Sierra  Leone 
there  had  been  boundary  conventions  with  France  in  1882, 
1889,  and  1891.  In  1889  the  second  convention  had  given 
the  general  lines,  and  these  had  been  corrected  in  1891. 
But  further  exploration  and  the  development  of  colonial 
ambitions  made  necessary  an  exact  setting  do^vn  of  what 
had  been  in  large  part  guess-work.     The  fourth  Anglo- 

*  For  the  earlier  history  of  the  British  west  African  colonies  see  p.  79. 


172         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

French  boundary  convention,  in  1895,  marked  the  begin- 
ning of  an  effort  to  delimit  the  frontiers.  In  Sierra  Leone 
the  boundary  with  Liberia  was  first  established  in  1902, 
and  in  Gambia  the  final  settlement  of  the  limits  of  French 
and  British  authority  was  reached  in  1899.  The  British 
were  compelled  to  exert  themselves  to  render  the  agreement 
effective.  A  portion  of  the  hinterland  was  annexed  to  the 
colony  in  1901,  and  the  rest  was  gradually  ''pacified"  dur- 
ing the  first  years  of  the  twentieth  century. 

In  the  Gold  Coast  and  in  Nigeria  boundary  agreements 
had  to  be  made  with  the  Germans  as  well  as  the  French. 
These  agreements  were  concluded  at  different  times  be- 
tween 1889  and  1906.  The  most  important  ones  for  the 
Gold  Coast  were  the  Anglo-French  convention  of  1898  and 
the  Anglo-German  convention  of  1899,  while  Nigeria  settled 
most  of  her  difficulties  with  France  in  1904  and  with  Ger- 
many in  1902.  The  arrangements  with  France  in  1898 
and  with  Germany  in  1899  were  followed  by  definitive 
annexation  of  Ashanti.  The  king  had  been  deposed 
in  1896.  A  rebellion  was  crushed  in  1900,  and  Ashanti  was 
annexed  to  the  British  crown  in  1901.  The  most  important 
step  in  the  extension  of  direct  British  sovereignty  over 
west  Africa  was  made  after  the  narrow  escape  from  war 
with  France.  The  vast  territories  of  the  Royal  Niger  Com- 
pany were  taken  over  by  the  British  government  in  1899 
and  1900. 

The  reconquest  of  the  Sudan,  whose  evacuation  in  1885 
had  been  a  great  blow  to  British  prestige,^  was  possible 
only  when  Lord  Cromer  made  Egj^t's  revenues  exceed  her 
expenditures  and  when  Lord  Kitchener  got  an  Egyptian 
army  into  good  fighting  shape.  Not  before  then  could  the 
argument  be  used  in  press  and  Parliament  that  Egypt  her- 
self would  contribute  substantially  in  men  and  money  to 
an  expedition  against  the  Mahdi,  who  had  been  supreme 

» See  pp.  93-94. 


REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)      173 

ruler  of  the  Sudan  ever  since  he  had  killed  General  Gordon. 
For  years  Lord  Cromer  skilfully  introduced  and  empha- 
sized in  his  annual  reports  the  necessity  of  the  reclamation 
of  the  Sudan.  Never  could  there  be  security  in  upper 
EgjTDt  until  the  Mahdi's  dervish  hordes  were  crushed. 
Never  would  irrigation  projects  on  a  large  scale  be  justi- 
fiable until  the  head-waters  of  the  Nile  were  under  Anglo- 
Egyptian  control.  Never  would  the  African  slave  traffic 
be  stopped  until  the  region  from  "Wady  Haifa  to  the  equator 
was  policed  by  Europeans.  Common  humanity  and  moral 
responsibihty  (arising  from  the  fact  that  Great  Britain 
controlled  Egypt  and  was  also  neighbor  on  the  south  to  the 
Sudan  by  reason  of  the  Uganda  protectorate)^  demanded 
that  Great  Britain  undertake  the  pacification  of  the  Su- 
dan. Because  of  the  dervish  cruelties  and  misrule  the 
native  population  was  rapidly  dying  out.  Last  of  all,  from 
the  point  of  view  of  European  prestige  in  Africa,  the 
Italian  defeat  at  Adowa  must  be  counteracted.^ 

Owing  to  the  stupendous  task  of  establishing  and  making 
secure  lines  of  communication,  which  necessitated  the  con- 
struction of  railway  and  telegraph  lines  across  the  Nubian 
Desert,  more  than  two  years  elapsed  between  the  invasion  of 
the  Sudan  in  March,  1896,  and  the  final  defeat  of  the  Mahdi 
at  Omdurman,  near  Khartum,  on  September  2,  1898.  Gen- 
eral Kitchener  was  raised  to  the  peerage  and  became  a  na- 
tional hero.  The  victory  over  the  Mahdi,  won  in  a  battle 
in  which  forty  thousand  der^dshes  were  crushed  at  the 
cost  of  less  than  five  hundred  killed  in  the  Anglo-Egj^ptian 

*  Working  through  missionaries  and  their  converts,  the  French  and  British 
governments  made  claims  and  counter-claims  to  Uganda  for  many  years  after 
the  country  was  first  opened  up.  In  1890  the  German  government  acknowl- 
edged the  territory  as  British,  though  the  French  continued  to  oppose  British 
pretensions.  In  1894  Uganda  (until  then  called  the  kingdom  of  Buganda) 
was  declared  a  British  protectorate.  But  not  until  the  reconquest  of  the  Sudan 
was  completed  and  the  French  were  checked  at  Fashoda  was  France  willing  to 
recognize  that  the  hope  of  adding  these  territories  to  her  African  empire  was 
definitely  dispelled. 

'See  Chapter  XIX. 


174         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

army,  captured  the  imagination  of  the  public.  The  British 
began  to  believe  that  they  were  the  people  of  destiny  chosen 
"ko  carry  the  ^' white  man's  burden." 

The  intensity  of  this  sentiment  was  evidenced  a  few 
weeks  later  when  Kitchener  arrived  at  Fashoda,  six  hun- 
dred miles  south  of  Khartum  on  the  White  Nile,  and 
hoisted  the  British  flag  beside  the  French  flag,  which  had 
been  planted  there  by  Captain  Marchand  on  July  10.  The 
British  refused  to  recognize  the  right  of  prior  occupation, 
and  the  French  had  to  choose  between  war  and  withdrawal. 
As  France  could  get  no  help  from  Russia,^  the  Marchand 
expedition  evacuated  Fashoda  in  December,  1898,  despite 
the  opposition  of  a  large  section  of  the  French  press,  which 
clamored  for  war.  The  Fashoda  incident,  bitter  humilia- 
tion as  it  was  for  France,  had  the  wholesome  effect  of  mak- 
ing French  statesmen  see  that  it  might  be  possible  as  well 
as  wise  to  arrive  at  an  understanding  with  Great  Britain 
over  moot  colonial  questions.  A  precedent  had  been  estab- 
lished in  the  settlement  of  the  Siamese  and  Nigerian  boun- 
dary disputes.  The  delimitation  of  zones  in  the  Sudan,  in 
March,  1899,  was  a  step  towards  the  arrangement  concluded 
five  years  later  by  which  Great  Britain  and  France  gave 
each  other  a  free  hand  respectively  in  Egypt  and  Morocco. 
The  two  nations  were  able  to  make  successive  diplomatic 
compromises  because  each  had  something  that  the  other 
wanted  with  which  to  bargain.  Germany,  on  the  other  hand, 
when  her  imperialism  came  into  conflict  with  the  imperi- 
alism of  Great  Britain  and  France,  was  invariably  in  the 
position  of  a  claimant,  not  of  a  bargainer. 

The  reconquest  of  the  Sudan  brought  under  British  con- 

*  The  Franco-Eussian  alliance  did  not  bind  Eussia  to  support  France  in  a 
war  arising  from  colonial  questions,  and  fought  outside  Europe.  The  motives 
that  led  Eussia  to  ally  herself  to  France  were  frankly  confessed:  Eussia  was 
interested  in  the  maintenance  of  the  balance  of  power  in  Europe  (see  p.  124)  ; 
and  she  was  glad  to  have  access  to  the  French  market  for  loans  under  favorable 
auspices.  So  clearly  understood  was  the  exclusion  of  extra-European  wars 
from  the  field  of  the  alliance  that  France's  neutrality  in  the  Eusso-Japanese 
■war,  six  years  after  Fashoda,  was  never  questioned. 


REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)      175 

trol  the  head-waters  of  the  Nile  and  an  important  part  of 
the  littoral  of  the  Red  Sea.  Great  Britain  became  a  neigh- 
bor of  Abyssinia  on  the  west  as  well  as  on  the  south  and 
northeast.  France's  dream  of  controlling  a  belt  of  Africa 
straight  across  the  continent  from  Senegal  on  the  Atlantic 
to  Djibouti  on  the  Gulf  of  Aden  was  destroyed,  while  Great 
Britain's  dream  of  a  similar  band  from  north  to  south — 
the  Cape-to-Cairo  "all  red  route" — was  immeasurably  ad- 
vanced. The  most  important  result  of  the  exploit  of  Kitch- 
ener, however,  was  the  change  in  the  attitude  of  the  British 
government  towards  its  position  in  Egypt,  which  naturally 
followed  the  occupation  of  nearly  a  million  square  miles  of 
Africa  south  of  Egypt  and  the  source  of  Egypt's  water 
supply.  A  convention  was  signed  at  Cairo  on  January  19, 
1899,  between  the  British  and  Egyptian  governments,  pro- 
viding for  joint  administration  of  the  Sudan.  Who  should 
have  title  over  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan,  in  case  Great 
Britain  evacuated  Egypt,  was  not  mentioned.^ 

The  revival  of  British  imperiaUsm  once  more  brought  to 
the  foreground  the  south  African  as  well  as  the  Sudanese 
question.  The  policy  of  Gladstone  in  abandoning  the  Su- 
dan was  reversed  when  the  reconquest  of  the  Sudan  was 
decided  upon.  Similarly,  the  solution  adopted  by  Glad- 
stone in  adjusting  the  relations  of  the  British  Empire  with 
the  Boers,  i.  e.,  rescinding  the  Transvaal  annexation  proc- 
lamation of  1877  and  recognizing  the  independence  of  the 
Transvaal  in  1881,  was  not  considered  definitive,  especially 
in  view  of  the  facts  that  since  Gladstone 's  time  the  British 
had  begun  to  develop  the  vast  resources  of  south  central 
Africa  and  that  gold  had  become  an  important  product  of 
the  Transvaal.  Bechuanaland,  to  the  west  of  the  Trans- 
vaal, had  been  made  a  protectorate  in  1891,  and  Matabele- 

^  This  thorny  question  has  always  been  a  source  of  difficulty  in  Anglo- 
Egyptian  relations,  especially  when  it  came  to  the  point  of  discussing  the 
terms  on  which  Egypt  should  be  given  her  freedom.  The  rights  of  Egypt  in 
the  Sudan  were  not  defined  by  the  report  of  the  Milner  commission  in  1921, 
nor  by  the  confirmation  of  the  British  government  in  February,  1922,  by  which 
the  Egyptian  Free  State  was  created. 


176         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

land,  to  the  north,  in  1894.  The  value  of  the  regions  north 
of  the  Transvaal  (now  known  as  Rhodesia)  was  becoming 
apparent.  Only  the  two  Boer  republics,  the  Transvaal  and 
the  Orange  Free  State,  stood  in  the  way  of  the  development 
and  consolidation  of  British  power. 

On  the  last  day  of  December,  1895,  Doctor  Jameson,  ad- 
ministrator of  Matabeleland,  made  a  raid  upon  the  Trans- 
vaal in  order  to  compel  President  Kriiger  to  yield  to  the 
demands  of  foreigners  resident  in  the  Transvaal.  An  up- 
rising at  Johannesburg  had  been  planned  with  the  conniv- 
ance of  Premier  Rhodes  of  Cape  Colony.  The  raid  failed, 
Jameson  and  his  companions  were  handed  over  to  the 
British  government  by  President  Kriiger  for  trial,  and 
Rhodes  was  forced  to  resign.  But  the  punishment  meted 
out  to  the  raiders  for  the  breach  of  international  good  faith 
was  very  slight,  and  Jameson  and  Rhodes  were  regarded 
by  British  public  opinion  as  not  having  been  guilty  of  a  dis- 
honorable act.  On  the  contrary,  the  Jameson  raid  reopened 
the  question  of  the  independence  of  the  Boer  republics. 
Had  they  the  right  to  block  the  path  of  progress? 

Like  every  other  quarrel,  there  were  faults  on  both  sides, 
and  the  aggressors  made  out  a  good  case  against  their  vic- 
tims. But  while  war  was  brewing,  and  during  the  three 
years  that  it  lasted,  many  Englishmen  denounced  the  policy 
of  their  government  and  the  brutal  methods  of  making  war 
that  the  British  were  compelled  to  adopt  in  order  to  break 
down  the  protracted  resistance  of  their  enemies.  The 
Anglo-Boer  War  began  in  1899,  and  soon  proved  to  be  a 
formidable  military  task,  involving  an  effort  far  beyond 
the  calculations  of  the  statesmen  and  generals  who  decided 
that  the  Boers  had  to  be  coerced.  The  Boer  element  in 
Cape  Colony  sympathized  with  the  burghers  of  the  re- 
publics, and  the  first  English  armies  sent  against  President 
Kriiger  met  with  disaster.  Even  after  two  years  of  fight- 
ing, when  the  Boers  were  overwhelmed  by  numbers  and 
had  come  virtually  to  the  end  of  their  resources,  they  kept 


REVIVAL  OF  BRITISH  IMPERIALISM  (1895-1902)      177 

up  a  guerrilla  warfare  that  proved  expensive  to  the  Brit- 
ish. On  August  7,  1901,  Lord  Kitchener  issued  a  drastic 
proclamation  announcing  the  annexation  of  the  Orange 
Free  State  and  the  'Mate  South  African  Republic,"  and 
declared  that  he  was  **  determined  to  put  an  end  to  a  state 
of  things  which  aimlessly  prolonged  bloodshed  and  destruc- 
tion and  inflicted  ruin  upon  the  great  majority  of  the  in- 
habitants, anxious  to  live  in  peace  and  to  earn  a  livelihood 
for  themselves  and  their  families." 

Ten  thousand  Boers  were  holding  in  check  a  British  army 
of  more  than  two  hundred  thousand.  Kitchener  was  com- 
pelled to  establish  concentration  camps,  in  which  there  was 
a  frightful  mortality  of  women  and  children,  and  to  extend 
the  area  of  ** pacified"  territory  by  means  of  a  chain  of 
blockhouses.  Only  by  this  means  could  the  Boers  be 
brought  to  surrender.  It  took  almost  a  year,  however,  of 
systematic  starving  and  smoking  out  before  the  burghers, 
facing  annihilation,  surrendered  unconditionally.  In  May, 
1902,  the  Boers  agreed  to  the  treaty  of  Vereeniging,  by 
which  the  Transvaal  and  the  Orange  Free  State  burghers 
recognized  Edward  VII  as  their  lawful  sovereign  and  sur- 
rendered their  independence,  mth  the  guaranty  that  they 
should  be  allowed  to  retain  the  use  of  their  language  and 
not  be  subjected  to  any  special  tax  to  defray  the  expenses 
of  the  war. 

The  Boer  War  aroused  bad  feeling  against  Great  Britain, 
especially  in  Holland  and  France.  But  the  wisdom  and 
magnanimity  of  the  conquerors  soon  convinced  the  world 
that  the  British  intended  to  treat  the  Boers  fairly  and  to 
give  them  equal  rights  with  themselves  in  south  Africa. 
This  generous  policy  made  possible  the  rapid  healing  of 
war  wounds  and  the  accomplishment  of  the  object  for  which 
the  war  had  been  fought — the  consolidation  of  south  Africa 
as  a  white  man's  land  under  the  British  crown. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

PERSIA  AND  THE  ANGLO-EUSSIAN  AGREEMENT  OF  1907 

RUSSIAN  penetration  southward  on  both  sides  of  the 
Caspian  Sea  was  at  the  expense  of  Persia.  The 
provinces  of  Transcaucasia,  containing  the  world's  richest 
oil-fields,  were  taken  from  that  country  in  war.  Most  of  the 
Transcaspian  Province,  especially  the  part  of  it  across 
which  runs  the  railway  from  the  Caspian  Sea  to  central 
Asia,  was  similarly  wrested  from  her.  Persia  is  one  of  the 
highways  to  the  open  sea  of  Russian  dreams.  It  was  nat- 
ural that  Russian  imperialism,  when  other  outlets  were 
temporarily  or  permanently  blocked,  should  try  to  travel 
by  the  Persian  road. 

Because  Persia  lay  on  one  of  the  routes  to  India,  Great 
Britain,  on  the  other  hand,  regarded  this  country  as  within 
her  sphere  of  influence.  We  have  seen  how,  in  1854  and 
1878,  the  British  prevented  the  Russians  from  reaching  the 
Mediterranean  through  Turkey.  The  same  general  policy 
of  being  ready  for  war  to  check  Russian  expansion  south- 
ward was  followed  also  in  Persia  and  Afghanistan.  Great 
Britain  fought  two  wars  for  the  control  of  Afghanistan,  and 
by  naval  activity  that  was  never  relaxed  at  any  time  in  the 
nineteenth  century  she  brought  and  kept  the  Persian  Gulf 
under  her  influence.  Turkey  and  France  experienced  the 
veto  of  England  on  the  littoral  of  the  gulf  and  of  the  adja- 
cent Arabian  peninsula.  When  Russia  began  to  build  rail- 
ways to  the  frontiers  of  Persia  and  Afghanistan,  Persia 
became  the  principal  field  in  which  Great  Britain  and  Rus- 
sia opposed  each  other's  ambition  to  dominate  Asia.  The 
twentieth  century  opened  with  Teheran  as  the  center  of 
British  and  Russian  diplomatic  intrigue. 

178 


PERSIA  AND  ANGLO-RUSSIAN  AGREEMENT  OF  1907  179 

Between  1872  and  1890  twelve  railway  promotion  groups 
received  concessions  from  the  Persian  government.  The 
Eeuter  group  started  to  construct  a  line  from  the  Caspian 
Sea  to  the  Persian  Gulf.  A  French  project  to  connect 
Tabriz  with  Trebizond  on  the  Black  Sea  was  underwritten 
by  Paris  bankers.  But  in  1890  Russia,  simply  to  frustrate 
the  plans  of  the  British  and  the  French,  secured  from  the 
Persian  government  the  exclusive  right  for  twenty-one 
years  to  build  railways  in  northern  Persia.  Russia  did  not 
even  survey  railway  routes.  She  did  nothing  herself,  and 
prevented  others  from  giving  Persia  the  indispensable  fac- 
tor of  economic  progress  that  virtually  every  country  in 
Asia  was  developing  through  European  capital.  Invoking 
the  excuse  of  Persia's  backwardness  and  administrative  an- 
archy, for  which  Russian  diplomacy  was  largely  respon- 
sible, Russia  attempted  to  bring  the  country  definitely 
within  her  sphere  of  influence. 

Since  the  Persians  were  powerless,  Russia  would  have 
succeeded  had  she  not  made  the  mistake  of  trying  to  extend 
her  political  and  commercial  influence  to  the  Persian  Gulf 
and  Afghanistan,  which  the  British  considered  exclusively 
theirs.  In  1900  the  Transcaspian  Railway  completed  its 
branch  from  Merv  to  the  Afghan  frontier,  and  Russian 
emissaries  and  traders  began  active  penetration  of  Afghan- 
istan. In  1901  Russian  diplomacy  interfered  in  the  British 
intrigue  to  detach  Kowei't  from  Turkish  suzerainty  and, 
when  this  failed,  challenged  Great  Britain's  claim  to  su- 
premacy in  the  Persian  Gulf.  A  steamship  line  from  Odessa 
to  Persian  Gulf  ports  was  established  in  February,  1901; 
Russian  war-ships  cruised  in  the  gulf;  and  Russian  agents 
purchased  land  in  the  islands  and  at  Bender-Abbas.  As 
Great  Britain's  title  to  close  the  Persian  Gulf  had  no  foun- 
dation in  treaties  or  international  law,  Russia  had  to  be 
stopped  indirectly.  In  1902  Great  Britain  made  an  alliance 
with  Japan,  who  was  preparing  to  attack  Russia. 

But  the  defeat  of  Russia  in  the  Far  East  led  only  to  the 


180         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

redoubling  of  efforts  to  open  a  way  to  the  sea  through 
Persia.  Despite  British  protests  and  threats,  a  Russian 
consulate  was  established  at  Bender-Abbas.  The  Russian 
Loan  Bank  secured  the  veto  power  over  future  foreign 
loans  for  seventy-five  years,  and  the  Persian  government 
began  to  pay  back  the  Anglo-Persian  loan  of  1892  with 
money  borrowed  from  Russia.  Neither  of  the  powers  was 
able  to  oust  the  other.  But  each  was  able  to  prevent  the 
other  from  developing  concessions  or  following  up  advan- 
tages. And  as  both  powers  refused  to  allow  Persia  to 
seek  money  elsewhere,  railways  remained  unbuilt  and  the 
country  fell  into  anarchy. 

A  British  commercial  mission  sent  to  study  conditions 
in  1906  recommended  the  division  of  the  country  into 
spheres  of  influence.  It  v\^as  obvious  to  business  men  in 
England  and  India  that  the  intrigues  and  counter-intrigues 
of  legations  and  consulates  were  ruining  the  hopes  of  get- 
ting financial  benefit  from  trade  privileges  and  concessions. 
Germany,  too,  by  building  the  Bagdad  Railway  and  threat- 
ening to  invade  the  financial  and  commercial  field,  made 
British  merchants  feel  that  a  three-cornered  fight  would 
be  less  profitable  than  dividing  with  Russia  and  keeping 
Gennany  out.  Anglo-French  relations  had  changed,  and 
Russia  was  the  ally  of  France.  Russian  officialdom  was 
more  tractable  than  before  the  events  of  1904-05.  Great 
Britain  and  Russia  got  together  as  Great  Britain  and 
France  had  done. 

On  September  24,  1907,  the  Anglo-Russian  convention 
was  communicated  to  the  ambassadors  of  the  powers  in 
Petrograd.  In  the  preamble  the  signatories  affirmed  their 
intention  to  maintain  the  independence  and  integrity  of 
Persia  and  to  allow  (this  is  the  word  in  the  text)  equal 
facilities  for  trade  to  all  nations.  But  the  convention  went 
on  to  say  that,  owing  to  the  proximity  of  Persia  to  their 
own  territories.  Great  Britain  and  Russia  had  ''special  in- 
terests."   The  first  article  defined  the  Russian  zone,  the 


PERSIA  AND  ANGLO-RUSSIAN  AGREEMENT  OF  1907  181 

second  the  British  zone,  the  third  a  neutral  zone ;  the  fourth 
confirmed  the  existing  mortgages  of  Persian  revenues,  and 
the  fifth  established  the  mutual  privilege,  "in  event  of  ir- 
regularities," of  instituting  control  over  the  revenues  in 
the  respective  zones.  A  letter  from  Sir  Edward  Grey  to 
the  British  ambassador  at  Petrograd,  published  simultane- 
ously with  the  convention,  announced  that  the  Persian 
Gulf  lay  outside  the  scope  of  the  understanding,  but  that 
the  Russian  government  had  agreed  during  the  negotia- 
tions ''not  to  deny  the  special  interests  of  Great  Britain  in 
the  gulf." 

Great  Britain  and  Russia  established  a  new  internal  and 
international  status  for  Persia  without  considering  the  in- 
terests or  consulting  the  wishes  of  the  Persians.  And,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  series  of  agreements  from  1890  to  1904 
between  Great  Britain  and  France,  the  other  powers  were 
notified  after  the  event.  In  1890  the  two  Occidental  powers 
gave  each  other  carte  blanche  in  Zanzibar  and  Madagascar, 
and  in  1904  in  Egypt  and  Morocco.  There  was  no  agree- 
ment among  the  powers  beforehand,  and  the  people  and  the 
rulers  most  vitally  concerned  were  not  notified.  In  virtu- 
ally every  instance  of  conventions  to  settle  colonial  rival- 
ries, the  compromises,  which  profoundly  affected  the  des- 
tinies of  Asiatics  and  Africans,  were  made  for  the  mutual 
advantage  of  the  ''high  contracting  parties"  and  to  the 
detriment  of  the  countries  whose  political  and  economic 
status  was  changed.^ 

The  Anglo-Russian  convention  was  conceived  and  put 
into  force  at  a  time  when  Asia  was  undergoing  experiences 
similar  to  those  that  Europe  experienced  in  1848.  After  the 
Russo-Japanese  War  a  wave  of  national  feeling  swept  over 
Asia,  and  in  every  country  there  was  a  movement  to  estab- 

^  If  one  believes  in  the  ubermensch  theory  he  will  challenge  this  statement. 
If  there  are  two  moralities,  one  for  Europe  and  America  and  the  other  for  the 
rest  of  the  world,  it  may  be  argued  that  Asiatic  and  African  peoples  receive 
ample  compensation  for  being, deprived  of  political  and  economic  independence 
in  the  benefits  they  get  from  material  and  moral  contact  with  our  superior 
civilization. 


182         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

lish  democratic  institutions  and  throw  off  foreign  control. 
The  two  aims  went  together.  Xenophobia  has  always  been 
a  phenomenon  of  agitation  for  self-government,  and  from 
Eunnymede  to  the  Italian  Risorgimento  the  rallying  cry 
has  been  the  same :  '' Out  with  the  foreigners ! "  Civil  war 
is  another  phenomenon  of  democratic  evolution.  Russia 
and  Great  Britain  played  one  Persian  party  against  an- 
other, and  seized  the  opportunity  offered  by  the  constitu- 
tional movement  to  occupy  with  armies  the  zones  they  had 
allotted  to  themselves. 

Having  thus  installed  themselves  in  their  zones,  the  two 
powers  sent  a  joint  note  to  the  Persian  government,  de- 
claring that  they  would  refuse  to  sanction  loans  from  other 
powers  if  these  loans  involved  the  granting  of  concessions 
to  any  other  powers  or  their  subjects  ''contrary  to  Russian 
or  British  political  and  strategic  interests."  Persia  re- 
fused to  accept  this,  or  indeed  to  recognize  the  Russo- 
British  protectorate  in  any  way;  whereupon  Petrograd 
and  London  warned  the  other  powers  and  international 
financial  circles  against  lending  money  to  or  seeking  con- 
cessions from  Persia. 

In  answer  to  British  complaints  that  order  was  not  be- 
ing preserved  along  the  trade  routes  of  southern  Persia, 
the  Persian  government  said  that  money  was  necessary  to 
reorganize  and  maintain  the  gendarmerie.  The  British  and 
Russian  governments  not  only  refused  to  lend  the  money, 
but  kept  in  their  own  hands  the  revenues  accruing  in  the 
zones  occupied  by  them — the  richest  parts  of  Persia,  in- 
cluding all  the  customs — and  prevented  Persia  from  raising 
a  loan  at  Paris  or  Berlin.  Persia  was  rendered  powerless 
to  take  measures  to  restore  peaceful  conditions.  This  gave 
the  Russians  a  pretext  to  send  more  troops  into  northern 
Persia;  while  the  British  informed  the  Persian  govern- 
ment that  the  state  of  anarchy  in  the  south  necessitated 
British  intervention  to  police  the  trade  route  from  Bushire 
to  Shiraz  and  Ispahan. 


PERSIA  AND  ANGLO-RUSSIAN  AGREEMENT  OF  1907  183 

Left  to  herself,  Persia  made  an  effort  to  strengthen  the 
central  administrations.  Frenchmen  were  employed  in  the 
ministry  of  justice  and  of  the  interior.  Swedish  officers 
were  engaged  to  reorganize  the  gendarmerie.  To  free  the 
finances  from  European  political  intrigue,  Persia  turned  to 
the  United  States.  Our  government  was  willing  to  suggest 
names  of  experts,  but  not  to  give  diplomatic  backing  to  any 
mission  that  might  be  chosen.  It  was  indicated  to  Persia 
that  Americans  who  went  to  Teheran,  although  they  had 
virtually  been  nominated  by  our  State  Department,  were 
to  be  private  citizens  on  a  mission  that  did  not  involve  the 
Washington  government. 

Mr.  W.  Morgan  Shuster,  a  former  government  official  in 
the  Philippines,  was  intrusted  with  the  task  of  managing 
Persian  finances.  Considering  that  he  was  in  the  service 
of  an  independent  state  to  work  for  the  interests  of  that 
state,  Mr.  Shuster  did  not  recognize  the  Anglo-Russian 
convention.^  The  Russians,  therefore,  demanded  his  dis- 
missal, under  threat  of  occupying  Teheran.  Sir  Edward 
Grey  explained  to  the  House  of  Commons  that  the  interests 
of  Great  Britain  dictated  the  support  of  the  Russian  ulti- 
matum. "When  a  member  asked,  *'How  about  the  interests 
of  Persia?"  Sir  Edward  was  silent.  The  Persian  parlia- 
ment rejected  the  ultimatum,  but,  under  pressure  from 
the  Russian  and  British  ministers,  it  was  prorogued,  and 
the  American  mission  had  to  leave. 

The  Anglo-Russian  expulsion  of  Mr.  Shuster,  on  Decem- 
ber 24,  1911,  ended  for  nine  years  the  independence  of 
Persia.  Money  now  had  to  be  borrowed  from  Russia  and 
Great  Britain,  from  whom  it  had  to  be  begged  in  small 
sums  at  high  interest.  Banking  operations  were  exclusively 
in  the  hands  of  Russian  and  British  banks,  in  which 
customs  receipts  had  to  be  deposited.    Although  her  nat- 

*  There  were,  of  course,  several  specific  acts  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Shuster  that 
offended  Eussia  and  demonstrated  the  American  expert's  intention  to  disre- 
gard the  Anglo-Russian  convention.  The  story  is  told  in  Mr.  Shuster 's  book, 
"The  Strangling  of  Persia." 


184         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ural  wealth  was  great  and  her  public  debt  small,  Persia  was 
reduced  to  a  state  of  financial  slavery.  The  two  '*  protect- 
ing powers,"  furthermore,  defeated  every  project  of  finan- 
cial, military,  and  economic  reform.  From  1900  to  1914 
the  railway  mileage  of  Asia  was  quadrupled,  and  the  con- 
sequent marvelous  increase  in  economic  prosperity  was 
shared  by  every  country  except  Persia,  where  no  railways 
were  built.  Every  effort  made  by  Persians  along  the  lines 
other  countries  were  following — extension  of  popular  edu- 
cation, improvement  and  consoUdation  of  fiscal  systems, 
working  out  and  testing  of  democratic  institutions — was  op- 
posed and  defeated  by  the  country's  masters,  with  the  tacit 
consent  of  the  other  powers. 

The  importance  of  the  Anglo-Russian  convention  is  two- 
fold. Germany  found  herself  shut  out  from  another  field 
of  expansion,  and  was  stimulated  to  fresh  effort  to  extend 
her  influence  in  Turkey.  In  Persia,  after  fifty  years  of 
bitter  struggle.  Great  Britain  and  Russia  were  able  to  bury 
their  animosity  and  to  compromise  their  conflicting  in- 
terests throughout  the  world.  The  cooperation  of  British 
democracy  and  Russian  autocracy  in  a  war  against  Ger- 
many was  made  possible.  For  Great  Britain  was  relieved 
of  anxiety  concerning  India,  and  Russian  statesmen  were, 
in  return,  encouraged  to  begin  the  diplomatic  negotiations 
that  resulted  in  the  abandonment  by  Great  Britain  of  oppo- 
sition to  the  eventual  Russian  annexation  of  Constantinople 
and  the  Straits.  The  Anglo-Russian  agreement  was  a 
necessary  corollary  to  the  Anglo-French  agreement  in  lay- 
ing the  bases  of  the  Triple  Entente. 


CHAPTER  XV 

EGYPT,  MOEOCCO,  AND  THE  ANGLO-FEENCH  AGREEMENT 

OF  1904 

ALTHOUGH  British  and  French  had  fought  side  by 
side  against  Russia  in  the  Crimean  War,  forty  years 
after  Waterloo,  during  the  reign  of  Napoleon  III,  there 
was  in  England  little  love  for  France.  For  the  Second 
Empire  prospered.  Especially  in  the  Near  East,  the  two 
Occidental  powers  were  commercial  rivals,  and  France  was 
accumulating  too  much  surplus  capital  for  investment 
abroad  to  avoid  the  adoption  by  her  government  of  a  for- 
eign policy  that  frequently  seemed  aggressive  in  the  eyes 
of  the  British  Foreign  Office.  Hence  it  was  not  surprising 
that  public  opinion  in  England  was  sympathetic  with  Prus- 
sia and  her  allies  in  the  war  of  1870,  and  that  the  defeat  of 
France  and  the  incorporation  of  Alsace-Lorraine  in  the 
new  German  Empire  were  hailed  by  the  British  with  quiet 
satisfaction.  Queen  Victoria's  ministers  and  the  interna- 
tional traders  and  bankers  of  London  were  only  human  in 
rejoicing  in  the  setback  to  French  political  and  financial 
prestige  throughout  the  world. 

During  the  last  thirty  years  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
which  were  the  first  generation  of  the  Third  Republic,  con- 
stant friction  disturbed  the  relations  between  London  and 
Paris,  due  to  the  fact  that  French  statesmen  and  bankers 
were  seeking  in  Africa  and  Asia  opportunities  for  invest- 
ment and  compensation  for  the  prestige  that  had  been  lost 
in  Europe.  We  have  seen  how  France  went  to  China,  Mada- 
gascar, the  Pacific  islands,  and  northern  and  western  Africa 
to  develop  titles  that  (with  the  exception  of  Algeria)  were 
scarcely  more  than  footholds,  but  that  offered  opportuni- 

185 


186  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ties  to  expand  into  contiguous  territories.  These  colonial 
activities  brought  France  into  diplomatic  conflicts  with 
Great  Britain  in  Asia,  Africa,  and  the  Pacific.  Moreover, 
France  allied  herself  mth  Eussia,  Great  Britain's  other 
colonial  rival.  Germany,  on  the  other  hand,  was  not  during 
these  decades  in  a  position  to  contest  the  expansion  of  the 
British  Empire,  as  were  France  and  Russia,  and,  although 
a  Weltpolitik  had  been  launched,  it  had  little  support  from 
the  German  people  and  so  was  not  a  menace  to  the  British. 

The  theory  advanced  during  the  recent  World  War,  that 
peoples  understand  each  other,  form  alliances,  and  fight 
side  by  side  because  they  have  common  ideals  and  are  in- 
spired by  a  common  desire  to  defend  civihzation,  is  difficult 
to  uphold  in  the  light  of  history,  even  of  the  most  recent 
history.  The  facts  of  Anglo-French  relations  prove  that 
the  Entente  Cordiale  is  the  result  of  a  realization  of  com- 
mon interests,  which  came  when  the  statesmen  of  the  two 
nations  concluded  that  the  prosperity  and  increasing  power 
of  Germany  were  more  to  be  feared  by  both  Great  Britain 
and  France  than  the  prosperity  and  power  of  each  were  to 
be  feared  by  the  other. 

In  the  New  Hebrides,^  in  the  extension  of  the  frontiers 
of  Burma  and  Indo-China,^  in  Egypt,^  in  Morocco,  in 
Arabia,'^  in  the  conquest  of  Madagascar  by  the  French  ^ 
and  of  the  eastern  Sudan  by  the  British,^  differences  of 
opinion  had  more  than  once  brought  the  two  nations  to  the 
verge  of  war.  The  most  serious  questions,  because  they 
were  the  most  vital,  were  those  of  Morocco  and  Eg}T)t.  It 
was  logical,  therefore,  that  the  agreement  that  sealed  the 
Entente  Cordiale  should  be  based  upon  a  sweeping  compro- 
mise regarding  Egypt  and  Morocco — a  compromise  of  a 
nature  to  assure  public  opinion  in  both  countries  that  there 
was  a  genuine  quid  pro  quo. 

^See  page  63.    'See  pp.  61-62,  168.    »See  p.  92.    *See  p.  75.    'See  p.  59. 
•See  p.  174. 


THE  ANGLO-FRENCH  AGREEMENT  OF  1904         187 

From  the  days  of  Mehemet  Ali,  France  regarded  Egypt 
as  a  country  in  which  French  culture  and  French  invest- 
ments were  to  predominate.  Despite  the  veto  of  the  Brit- 
ish government  and  London  bankers,  a  French  company 
secured  a  concession  for  the  Suez  Canal,  and  financed  and 
carried  through  the  project.  Six  years  after  the  canal 
was  opened  the  British  government  became  the  controlHng 
stockholder.  When  the  Egyptian  treasury  fell  behind  in 
interest  payments  on  the  national  debt,  France  and  Great 
Britain  established  a  joint  financial  control.  But  Great 
Britain  alone  occupied  Egj^t  and  took  over  the  administra- 
tion of  the  country.  The  original  occupation  could  not  have 
been  considered  trickery  or  unfairness  to  France ;  for  Lon- 
don had  invited  Paris  to  take  part,  first,  in  bombarding 
Alexandria,  and,  second,  in  landing  troops.  What  rankled 
in  the  minds  of  the  French  was  the  continued  occupation  of 
Egypt,  carrying  with  it  sole  British  administrative  control. 
British  statesmen  had  assured  France  and  the  other  powers 
that  the  occupation  was  to  be  temporary  and  would  not 
infringe  upon  the  rights  and  privileges  of  the  sultan  of 
Turkey,  of  the  European  powers,  and  of  the  Egyptian  gov- 
ernment.^ 

Time  did  not  reconcile  the  French  to  the  fait  accompli 
of  the  British  occupation.  The  loss  of  Egj^pt  (for  it  was  so 
regarded)  came  up  frequently  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies, 
and  the  statesmen  who  had  allowed  Great  Britain  to  act 
alone  and  those  who  had  not  brought  pressure  to  bear  later 
to  oust  the  British  found  the  Egyptian  question  a  vulner- 
able place  in  their  political  armor.  Among  the  French 
people  it  was  felt  that  British  control  of  the  canal  and  the 
seizure  of  Egypt  were  the  result  of  France's  weakness 
after  the  war  of  1870,  of  which  the  British  had  taken  unfair 
advantage. 

Nominally  Egypt  was  an  autonomous  vilayet  (province) 

*For  a  (Jiscussion  of  Great  Britain's  pledges  see  pp.  91-92,  505-507. 


188         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  ruled  by  a  khedive  (viceroy).  The 
relations  between  Egypt  and  other  nations  had  been  estab- 
lished by  treaties  with  Turkey.  Europeans  and  Americans 
enjoyed  the  privileges  of  a  capitulatory  regime,  as  in  Tur- 
key. Their  interests  were  looked  after  by  consuls-general 
in  Cairo,  exercising  diplomatic  functions,  and  by  consuls 
and  consular  agents  in  other  cities.  Justice  was  adminis- 
tered by  consular  courts  and  mixed  tribunals  of  European 
and  Egyptian  judges.  The  Egyptian  debt  was  under  in- 
ternational control,  and  representatives  of  the  powers 
supervised  the  expenditure  of  revenues  affected  to  pay  the 
interest  on  the  debt. 

The  government  of  the  khedive  was  carried  on  by  a  min- 
istry, with  a  premier,  as  in  European  states;  but,  as  in 
Oriental  states,  the  khedive  kept  legislative  authority  in 
his  own  hands.  His  national  council  and  national  assembly 
were  advisory  bodies,  possessing  only  such  authority  as 
he  was  willing  for  them  to  have. 

Practically,  Egypt  Avas  quit  of  Turkish  control  with  the 
payment  of  a  tribute  and  the  flying  of  the  Turkish  flag. 
After  the  British  occupation  the  ruler  of  the  country  be- 
came the  British  consul-general,  who  governed  through  ad- 
visers in  the  different  ministries.  For  the  sake  of  form, 
the  diplomatic  agents  of  other  countries  looked  upon  the 
khedive  as  ruler  of  Egypt,  and  carried  on  negotiations  with 
the  khedive 's  ministry.  In  fact,  all  matters  were  decided 
at  the  British  agency.  The  khedive  was  a  figure-head  and 
his  ministers  were  figure-heads.  The  final  authority  was 
the  British  cabinet,  to  whom  the  consul-general  made  an  an- 
nual report.  Great  Britain's  position  in  Egypt  was  main- 
tained by  a  garrison  in  the  Cairo  citadel,  and  by  control  of 
the  Egyptian  army  through  British  officers,  who  held  the 
principal  commands. 

This  situation  was  possible  only  through  the  impotence 
of  Turkey,  the  acquiescence  of  the  powers,  and  the  will- 
ingness of  the  British  to  live  under  the  outward  semblance 


THE  ANGLO-FRENCH  AGREEMENT  OF  1904         189 

of  Egyptian  authority.*  To  remain  in  Egypt,  it  was  neces- 
sary for  the  British  to  keep  Turkey  and  the  powers  from 
interfering  and  to  prevent  a  movement  on  the  part  of  the 
khedive  and  the  educated  Egyptians  to  take  back  into  their 
own  hands  the  control  of  the  country. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century  educated 
Egyptians  began  to  conspire  against  the  British  occupation. 
British  rule  had  brought  prosperity  and  tranquillity;  but 
there  were  no  evidences  of  carrying  out  the  promises  to 
leave  Egypt.  On  the  contrary,  the  reconquest  of  the  Sudan 
seemed  to  indicate  that  the  British  intended  to  make  Egypt 
a  colony  or  a  protectorate.  Khedive  Abbas  Hilmi,  who  had 
succeeded  to  the  throne  in  1892,  sympathized  with  the  na- 
tionalists, and  declared  that  material  blessings,  however 
great,  could  not  compensate  any  people  for  the  loss  of  the 
privilege  of  managing  their  own  affairs.  One  can  hardly 
blame  him  for  not  appreciating  his  benefits  as  much  as  his 
benefactors  did,  especially  as  it  was  constantly  in  his  mind 
that,  although  they  were  doing  well  by  Egypt,  they  were 
inspired,  not  by  love  for  Egypt,  but  by  the  fact  that 
their  country  had  decided  that  it  was  to  her  own  interest 
to  remain  in  Egypt  in  order  to  keep  control  of  the  Suez 
Canal. 

Abbas  Hilmi  was  too  completely  at  the  mercy  of  Lord 
Cromer,  the  British  consul-general,  who  could  have  de- 
posed him  in  a  minute,  to  side  openly  with  the  nationalist 
movement;  and  the  agitators  were  not  a  serious  menace 
until  they  began  to  receive  outside  encouragement  and 
financial  aid.  Mustafa  Kamel,  leader  of  the  nationalist 
movement,  imbibed  his  democratic  notions,  and  conceived 
the  idea  of  a  free  Egypt,  in  Paris,  where  influential  French- 
men saw  in  him  the  best  sort  of  firebrand  to  throw  into 

*  The  British  military  and  civilian  officials  in  Egyptian  government  service 
wore  the  fez  and  styled  themselves  ' '  servants  of  the  khedive. ' '  The  ruler 
was  given  the  same  symbols  of  respect  that  other  sovereigns  enjoyed,  and  the 
British  applied  to  the  court  chamberlain  for  ' '  an  audience  of  his  Highness, ' ' 
and,  when  they  received  it,  courtesied  to  the  khedive  as  they  would  to  their 
own  king. 


190         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Egypt  in  revenge  for  the  attitude  of  Cromer  and  Kitch- 
ener at  Fashoda.^  Although  intellectually  limited,  Mustafa 
Kamel  had  enthusiasm,  magnetism,  and  the  gift  of  pubUc 
speaking — qualities  that  the  demagogue  must  have;  He 
could  be  inspired  and  directed  by  French  journalists  work- 
ing discreetly  behind  the  scenes. 

At  the  end  of  1899  Mustafa  Kamel  returned  to  Cairo 
from  Paris,  and  gathered  around  him  a  group  of  influential 
and  thoughtful  people  whom  he  could  never  have  attracted 
if  French  intrigue  had  not  been  at  work.  Mustafa  Kamel 
was  the  sho\vy  faQade  of  the  movement.  But  the  British 
knew  that  behind  him  stood  a  new  group  of  whom  he  was 
not  the  leader.  They  knew  also  that  French  brains  and 
money  were  responsible  for  the  foundation  of  the  Arabic 
newspaper  Leiva,  which  within  a  year  became  the  most 
widely  circulated  journal  in  Egj^t.  The  nationahst 
movement  organized  a  propaganda,  through  the  local 
Moslem  clergy  and  the  Lewa,  which  reached  the  felldhin 
(peasants). 

Mustafa  Kamel  and  his  associates  thought  that  giving 
their  propaganda  a  religious  character  was  essential  to  its 
success;  but  in  doing  this  they  brought  about  its  failure. 
Indeed,  the  nationalist  movement,  originally  launched  by 
the  French  to  make  trouble  for  the  British,  actually  pre- 
pared the  way  for  the  Anglo-French  understanding.  Mus- 
tafa Kamel 's  speeches  and  writings  in  Egypt  and  the  Young 
Egyptian  congresses  in  Switzerland  caused  alarm  among 
far-seeing  French  statesmen,  who  saw  in  pan-Islamism 
menace  to  their  own  colonial  interests.  From  the  mo- 
ment of  its  birth  the  Egyptian  nationalist  movement  was 
a  boomerang  to  the  French.  Launched  to  hit  the  British  in 
Egypt,  it  bid  fair  to  hit  every  European  power  that  held 
Mohammedans  in  subjection,  but  especially  the  French 
themselves  in  north  and  west  Africa.  The  most  bitter 
Anglophobes  began  to  feel  the  necessity  of  a  colonial  agree- 

'  See  p.  174. 


THE  ANGLO-FRENCH  AGREEMENT  OF  1904         19X 

ment  with  Great  Britain.  Through  the  nationalist  move- 
ment, however,  they  had  proved  what  mischief  they  were 
capable  of  causing,  and  made  British  statesmen  feel  that 
it  would  be  worth  while  to  make  concessions  to  France 
elsewhere  in  order  to  call  off  the  efforts  to  undermine  Great 
Britain's  position  in  Egypt. 

The  part  of  Africa  nearest  Europe  and  America,  and 
adjoining  the  highly  developed  colony  of  Algeria,  was,  at 
the  opening  of  the  twentieth  century,  the  most  backward,  the 
most  unknown,  the  most  inaccessible.  On  account  of 
the  rivalry  of  the  powers,  Morocco  had  remained  outside 
all  European  spheres  of  influence.  The  powers  most  in- 
terested in  whatever  changes  were  to  be  made  in  the  politi- 
cal status  of  this  Moorish  corner  of  Africa  were,  because 
of  propinquity,  France  and  Spain.  The  ambition  of  France 
was  to  round  out  her  north  African  empire  by  extending 
her  protectorate  over  Morocco,  as  she  had  done  over 
Tunisia  two  decades  earlier.  Spain,  whose  foothold  on  the 
Moroccan  coast  dated  back  to  the  sixteenth  century,  had 
never  succeeded  in  extending  her  influence  over  the 
hinterland,  and  did  not  possess  the  strength  either  to  in- 
timidate the  Moors  herself  or  to  help  them  resist  French 
pressure. 

Germany  and  Great  Britain  worked  together  to  block 
the  French.  Both  powers  were  influenced  by  trade  consid- 
erations, and  Great  Britain,  in  addition,  did  not  like  the 
idea  of  French  control  over  territories  opposite  Gibraltar. 
The  British  were  more  vigorous  than  the  Germans  in  their 
determination  to  prevent  France  from  repeating  what  she 
had  done  in  Tunisia.  The  British  contended  that  the  inde- 
pendence of  the  shereefian  empire  must  be  upheld  at  all 
costs.  What  Emperor  William  said  at  Tangier  in  1905, 
and  what  the  German  press  wrote  during  the  crises  of  Al- 
geciras  and  Agadir,^  is  substantially  what  has  been  said  in 
more  than  one  speech  from  the  throne  of  Queen  Victoria 

»See  Chapter  XVII. 


192         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  what  the  British  press  wrote  up  to  the  time  of  the 
bargain  with  France. 

During  the  five  years  preceding  the  agreement  of  1904 
France,  thwarted  at  Fashoda  and  converted  to  the  neces- 
sity of  a  constructive  and  logical  African  program,  began 
an  effort  to  secure  the  Moroccan  "kej^  to  her  house."  The 
German  legation  was  a  very  poor  second  to  the  British 
legation  in  opposing  French  attempts  to  gain  control  of 
the  Moroccan  army,  to  obtain  harbor  and  mining  conces- 
sions, and  to  secure  a  rectification  of  Algerian  frontiers. 
The  French  began  to  realize  that,  while  they  might  suc- 
cessfully combat  German  intrigue,  there  was  no  hope  of 
doing  anything  in  Morocco  without  the  consent  of  the 
British.  France  had  a  sincere  desire  and  a  very  good  rea- 
son for  wishing  to  see  peace  and  order  and  economic  pros- 
perity brought  to  Morocco.  But  the  Anglo-German  policy 
paralyzed  every  effort  of  Moroccan  and  French  authorities 
to  improve  political  and  economic  conditions  in  the  north- 
western corner  of  Africa.  The  British  minister,  advising 
the  sultan  of  Morocco  as  a  friend  whose  interests  he  had  at 
heart,  urged  him  to  resist  French  advances  and  combat 
French  influences.  Immediately  after  the  agreement  of 
1904  was  signed,  he  told  the  sultan  that  he  must  do  what  the 
French  said.  The  British  minister  at  Teheran  acted  in 
the  same  way  with  the  Persians  in  regard  to  Eussia  before 
and  after  the  agreement  of  1907. 

The  three  documents  embodying  the  agreement  between 
Great  Britain  and  France,  in  which  Egypt  and  Morocco  were 
the  principal  pa^vns,  were  published  in  Paris  on  April  8. 
France  recognized  Great  Britain's  predominant  posi- 
tion in  Egypt  and  promised  not  to  raise  again  the  question 
of  the  temporary  character  of  the  British  occupation.  In 
return.  Great  Britain  recognized  the  special  interests  of 
France  in  Morocco  and  promised  to  place  no  obstacles  in 
the  way  of  French  intervention  to  maintain  order  and  assist 
the  sultan  in  reforms.     France  agreed  to  treat  British 


THE  ANGLO-FRENCH  AGREEMENT  OF  1904        193 

commerce  in  Morocco  on  equality  with  French  for  thirty 
years  and  not  to  annex  or  erect  fortifications  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  the  Straits  of  Gibraltar  and  to  prevent  any 
other  jjower  from  doing  so. 

The  secondary  adjustments  or  compromises  were:  (1) 
France  abandoned  the  right  of  landing  and  drying  fish  on 
the  shore  of  Newfoundland,  granted  by  the  treaty  of 
Utrecht  in  1714,  in  return  for  the  cession  of  territory  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Gambia  River  and  of  the  Los  Islands  in 
west  Africa  and  the  rectification  of  the  frontier  in  Algeria 
which  would  give  France  a  direct  route  to  Lake  Chad  with- 
out passing  through  the  desert;  (2)  while  disclaiming  any 
intention  of  annexing  Siamese  territory,  French  influence 
was  recognized  as  predominant  in  the  valley  of  the  Me- 
kong and  British  in  the  valley  of  the  Menam;  (3)  Great 
Britain  abandoned  her  protests  against  French  tariffs  in 
Madagascar;  (4)  a  joint  commission  was  to  be  created 
for  administering  the  New  Hebrides  Islands. 

The  agreement  contained  five  secret  articles,  not  made 
public  until  1911,  and  then  only  because  there  was  a  wide- 
spread suspicion  in  England  that  they  committed  Great 
Britain  to  a  defensive  alliance  with  France.  But  these  ar- 
ticles provided  only  for  judicial  and  financial  questions  and 
for  contingencies  that  might  arise  in  connection  with 
Spain's  hold  on  the  coast  opposite  Gibraltar. 

Germany  felt  that,  as  Great  Britain  and  France  did  not 
own  Egj^t  and  Morocco,  it  was  impossible  to  admit  the 
right  of  British  and  French  statesmen  thus  to  dispose  of 
these  important  countries,  protecting  themselves  at  the 
expense  of  other  powers  as  well  as  of  the  peoples  whose 
destinies  they  were  arranging  without  consulting  them. 
The  agreement  of  1904  brought  Great  Britain  and  France 
together,  and  in  the  end  made  them  allies  against  Germany. 
For,  as  far  as  Morocco  was  concerned,  Germany  refused 
to  admit  that  the  agreement  possessed  international 
validity. 


194         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Germany  attempted  to  prevent  France  from  occupy- 
ing Morocco.  Great  Britain  sided  with  France.  Public 
opinion  was  aroused,  in  France  and  Great  Britain  against 
Germany,  and  in  Germany  against  Great  Britain  and 
France,  over  a  question  that  in  reality  affected,  even  in- 
directly, only  a  small  number  of  their  respective  subjects. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  GERMAN  WELTPOLITIK 
(1883-1905) 

ON  the  twenty-fifth  anniversary  of  the  foundation  of 
the  German  Empire,  Kaiser  Wilhelm  II  said :  '  *  May 
our  German  Fatherland  become  one  day  so  powerful  that, 
as  one  formerly  used  to  say,  Civis  romanus  suyn,  one  may 
in  the  future  say  only,  Ich  bin  ein  deutscher  Burger." 
This  statement  revealed  a  lack  of  appreciation  of  the 
difference  between  the  Roman  and  the  nineteenth-century 
European  ideas  of  citizenship.  The  apostle  Paul  had  no 
Latin  blood  in  his  veins,  had  never  been  to  Rome,^  and 
what  non-Jemsh  culture  he  had  imbibed  was  Greek  and  not 
Latin.  Roman  citizenship  was  a  patent,  like  a  title  of  no- 
bility, conferred  upon  people  throughout  the  empire  for 
services  rendered  or  as  a  matter  of  poHcy.  The  Roman 
Empire  was  a  system  of  government,  based  upon  the  idea 
of  a  dominant  caste,  not  of  a  dominant  race.  The  accident 
of  being  born  of  certain  blood  and  in  a  certain  place  did 
not  of  itself  entail  exclusive  rights  and  privileges  and  op- 
portunities of  exploiting  the  inhabitants  of  other  countries. 
Throughout  the  centuries  of  overseas  expansion  the 
European  nations  followed  exploration  with  missionary 
propaganda  and  conquest.  It  was  natural  that  peoples 
who  found  themselves,  by  reason  of  military  strength, 
knowledge,  and  financial  resources,  enabled  to  impose  their 
will  upon  weaker  nations  should  begin  to  believe  in  the 
superiority  of  their  blood  and  civilization.  But  gradually 
the  European  nations  came  into  conflict  with  one  another 
outside  Europe,  and  fell  to  using  non-Europeans  and  non- 

*  At  the  time  Paul  invoked  his  citizenship  as  a  protection   (ef.  Acts  xxii: 
25-29).    It  was  undoubtedly  this  incident  that  the  kaiser  had  in  mind. 

195 


196         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Christians  against  each  other.  These  practices,  which  were 
in  reality  the  original  challenge  to  the  pretension  of  Europe 
to  the  right  of  eminent  domain  in  the  other  continents  and 
which  gave  non-Christians  a  right  to  question  the  sincerity 
of  missionary  propaganda,  had  already  been  adopted  in 
the  colonial  wars  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Therefore,  in 
the  struggles  that  succeeded  the  French  Revolution,  the  new 
conception  of  nationality  bred  among  the  rival  peoples  of 
Europe  the  tendency  to  adopt  the  Uebermensch  theory  in 
their  relations  with  one  another.  In  the  next  generation 
universal  military  service  and  the  glittering  reward  of 
great  economic  prosperity  involved  whole  peoples  in  the 
bitterness  of  international  rivalry,  and  they  succumbed  to 
the  temptation  of  seeking  by  force  the  aggrandizement  of 
their  particular  nations  throughout  the  world. 

When  Wilhelm  II  ascended  the  throne  modern  political 
Germany  was  in  her  eighteenth  year  and  her  first  colonies 
were  in  their  fifth  year.  The  Weltpolitik  (world  policy)  of 
Germany  was  largely  a  development  of  the  thirty  years  of 
his  reign.  The  kaiser  was  the  product  of  the  era  in  which 
he  ruled.  Noisily  aggressive  as  it  was,  we  must  judge 
his  leadership  in  the  light  of  the  situation  in  which  Ger- 
many found  herself. 

After  the  successful  war  of  1870,  united  Germany  entered 
upon  the  greatest  era  of  industrial  growth  and  prosperity 
that  has  ever  been  enjoyed  by  any  nation.  Not  even  the 
United  States,  with  the  help  of  emigration  and  of  new 
territories  to  open  up,  could  boast  of  a  development  in  pro- 
ductive activities  and  means  of  communication  comparable 
to  that  of  Germany.  In  old  central  Europe  cities  sprang  up 
almost  overnight ;  railways  and  canals  were  built  until  the 
empire  became  a  network  of  steel  and  of  inland  waterways ; 
mines  and  factories  sprang  into  being;  the  population  in- 
creased more  than  fifty  per  cent,  in  forty  years.  Germany 
began  to  look  to  the  extra-European  world  for  markets. 
She  was  reaching  the  point  where  her  productivity  exceeded 


GERMAN  WELTPOLITIK  (1883-1905)  197 

her  power  of  consumption.  Where  could  she  find  mar- 
kets for  the  goods?  German  merchants,  and  not  Prussian 
militarists,  began  to  spread  abroad  the  idea  that  there  was 
a  world  equilibrium,  as  important  to  the  future  of  the  na- 
tions of  Europe  as  was  the  European  equilibrium.  Ger- 
many, becoming  a  competitor,  saw  that  the  prosperity  of 
Great  Britain  was  due  to  trade,  and  that  the  security  and 
volume  of  this  trade  depended  upon  colonies. 

The  first  instance  of  the  awakening  on  the  part  of  the 
German  people  to  a  sense  that  there  was  something  that 
interested  them  outside  of  Europe  was  the  annexation  by 
Great  Britain  in  1874  of  the  Fiji  Islands,  with  which  Ger- 
man traders  had  just  begun  to  build  up  a  business.  Be- 
cause the  infant  empire  was  engaged  in  its  struggles  with 
the  church  and  socialism,  and  the  relations  between  the 
Reichstag  and  the  Bundesrath  were  still  in  an  experimental 
stage,  Germany  was  not  in  a  position  to  adopt  a  vigorous 
foreign  policy  or  to  seek  her  share  of  the  world  by  taking 
what  Great  Britain  and  Russia  and  France  had  not  yet 
taken.  But  the  Germans  began  to  feel  that  in  the  future 
Germany  ought  to  be  consulted  concerning  the  further  ex- 
tension of  the  sovereignty  of  any  European  nation  over  any 
part  of  the  world  then  unoccupied  or  still  independent  of 
foreign  control. 

German  trade,  at  the  very  moment  when  it  was  begin- 
ning to  seek  world  markets,  was  confronted  by  the  British 
occupation  of  Cyprus  in  1878  and  of  Egypt  in  1882,  the 
French  occupation  of  Tunisia  in  1881,  and  Russian,  French, 
and  British  dealings  with  China,  Siam,  Afghanistan, 
Persia,  and  the  peoples  of  central  Asia.  The  educated  and 
moneyed  classes  in  Germany  started  an  agitation  to  im- 
press upon  the  government  the  necessity  of  entering  the 
colonial  field.  When  Bismarck  had  successfully  concluded 
the  critical  struggle  with  the  socialists,  the  decks  were 
cleared  for  action.  In  1882  a  Bremen  trader,  by  treaties 
with  the  native  chiefs,  gained  control  of  the  Bay  of  Angra 


198         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Pequena  on  the  west  coast  of  Africa.  For  two  years  no 
attention  was  paid  to  this  treaty,  which  was  a  private  com- 
mercial affair.  In  1884,  shortly  after  the  occupation  of 
Egypt,  a  dispute  arose  between  the  British  authorities  at 
Cape  Town  and  Herr  Liideritz,  the  owner  of  Angra 
Pequena.  Bismarck  saw  that  he  must  act  or  the  old  story 
of  British  sovereignty  would  be  repeated.  He  telegraphed 
to  the  German  consul  at  Cape  Town  that  the  imperial  gov- 
ernment had  annexed  the  coast  and  hinterland  from  the 
Orange  River  to  Cape  Frio. 

From  1884  to  1886  other  annexations  in  Africa  and  the 
Pacific  were  made.  The  east  coast  of  Africa,  north  of 
Cape  Delgado  and  the  River  Rovuma,  and  Kamerun  and 
Togo,  on  the  Gulf  of  Guinea,  were  put  under  the  German 
flag.  In  the  Pacific  Kaiser  WiLhelm's  Land  was  formed 
of  a  part  of  New  Guinea,  with  some  adjacent  islands, 
and  the  Bismarck  Archipelago,  the  Solomon  Islands,  and 
the  Marshall  Islands  were  gathered  in.  Since  those  early 
years  of  feverish  activity  there  were  no  new  acquisitions 
in  Africa,  other  than  the  part  of  the  French  Congo  ceded 
to  Germany  in  1912  ''as  compensation"  for  the  French 
protectorate  over  Morocco.  In  the  Pacific,  in  1899,  after 
the  American  conquest  of  the  Philippines,  the  Carohne, 
Pelew,  and  Marianne  groups  were  added  by  purchase  from 
Spain,  and  two  of  the  Samoan  islands  were  allotted  to 
Germany  by  an  arrangement  with  Great  Britain  and  the 
United  States. 

The  four  colonies  in  Africa  and  the  groups  of  Pacific 
islands  were  of  Httle  intrinsic  and  of  no  strategic  value. 
The  very  fact  that  they  had  remained  without  European 
masters  until  the  eighties  of  the  nineteenth  century  was 
proof  that  they  were  comparatively  worthless  and  that 
none  of  them  contained  a  harbor  capable  of  being  converted 
into  a  naval  base.  Even  the  Pacific  islands  acquired  from 
Spain  were  left-overs  that  the  United  States  had  not  cared 
to  take  in  the  treaty  following  the  Cuban  War.    The  Afri- 


GERMAN  WELTPOLTTIK  (1883-1905)  199 

can  colonies  made  Germany  a  neighbor  of  Great  Britain, 
France,  Belgium,  Spain,  and  Portugal.  Until  a  few  years 
before  the  World  War  the  Belgian  Congo  enjoyed  an  in- 
ternational status,  and  was  controlled  by  a  private  com- 
pany under  King  Leopold  and  not  directly  by  the  Belgian 
government.  The  parts  of  the  Congo  Free  State  touching 
the  German  colonies  were  simply  interior  jungle-land,  of 
which  Germany  already  had  more  than  she  could  develop. 
The  little  Spanish  colony  bordering  on  Kamerun  was  of  no 
importance.  The  adjacent  French  and  British  colonies  in 
west  Africa  and  the  British  possessions  in  southwest  and 
east  Africa  offered  no  possibility  of  German  expansion.^ 
Consequently  it  was  difficult  for  the  young  colonial  party  to 
awaken  enthusiasm  for  overseas  possessions  that  were  un- 
attractive for  large  capital  investment,  for  trade  develop- 
ment, or  for  colonization.  Moreover,  as  occasions  for  fric- 
tion mth  other  powers  did  not  exist,  these  colonies  afforded 
to  ''greater  Germany"  advocates  no  opportunity  to  foster 
a  jingo  spirit. 

In  studying  the  Weltpolitik  it  is  essential  to  emphasize 
the  fact  that  the  colonies  acquired  between  1883  and  1888 
were  a  deterrent  rather  than  a  stimulus  in  creating  and 
maintaining  a  current  of  public  opinion  for  the  support  of 
an  aggressive  foreign  policy.  Very  few  Germans  took  an 
interest  in  the  colonies,  which  were  regarded  as  an  ex- 
pensive luxury;  and  in  the  Eeichstag  and  the  press  events 
such  as  the  Herero  War  in  southwest  Africa  were  used 
successfully  to  discredit  the  colonial  ventures  of  the  govem- 
ment.2    Not  until  after  the  first  Moroccan  crisis,  when  the 

*  Germany 's  sole  chance  for  an  attractive  and  interesting  colonial  develop- 
ment lay  in  the  acquisition  of  a  part  or  all  of  Portugal's  colonies.  The  two 
largest  of  these  lay  to  the  north  and  south  respectively  of  German  Southwest 
Africa  and  German  East  Africa.  For  the  Anglo-German  pourparlers  to  divide 
the  Portuguese  colonies,  see  p.  475. 

^  The  Herero  War,  begun  in  the  autumn  of  1903,  did  not  end  until  1907; 
but  the  events  that  aroused  the  greatest  criticism  in  Germany,  and  indeed  in 
other  countries,  occurred  in  1904.  General  von  Trotha,  whose  cruelties  had 
given  rise  to  sharp  debates  in  the  Eeichstag,  was  recalled  in  1905,  before  the 
colonial  question  became  a  campaign  issue. 


200         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

colonies  were  more  than  twenty  years  old,  did  the  German 
people  elect  a  Reichstag  committed  to  the  political  support 
and  financial  development  of  the  colonies. 

The  Germans  realized  that  they  had  to  take  the  world  as 
they  found  it.  It  was  futile  to  hope  to  build  up  a  world 
empire  by  colonizing  unoccupied  territories  in  the  temperate 
zone.  There  were  none.  As  for  establishing  their  protec- 
torate over  weaker  nations,  the  Americas  were  excluded  by 
the  Monroe  Doctrine,  and  Great  Britain,  Eussia,  and 
France  had  anticipated  them  in  the  worth-while  parts  of 
Asia  and  Africa.  China  could  be  further  despoiled  only 
by  acting  in  concert  with  the  other  powers.  The  Ottoman 
Empire  alone  offered  to  a  great  power  the  possibility  of 
securing  predominant  influence.  Beyond  taking  a  share  of 
the  loot  in  China  and  attempting  to  get  the  upper  hand  in 
what  remained  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  Germany  could 
hope  for  no  more  than  to  keep  open  doors  for  her  commerce 
by  opposing  the  efforts  of  other  powers  to  gobble  up  the 
few  African  and  Asiatic  countries  that  retained  a  semblance 
of  independence.  The  possibilities  for  Germany  were, 
therefore:  (1)  getting  a  foothold  in  China;  (2)  becoming 
the  predominating  power  in  the  Ottoman  Empire;  and  (3) 
thwarting  French  ambitions  in  Morocco  and  British  and 
Russian  ambitions  in  Persia.  The  other  phases  of  the 
Weltpolitik  were:  (1)  to  find  a  means  by  which  Germans 
who  went  abroad  to  live  would  not  lose  their  loyalty  to  the 
fatherland;  and  (2)  to  build  up  a  merchant  marine  and  a 
navy  for  its  protection. 

In  China,  where  all  the  acquisitions  of  European  powers 
were  of  comparatively  recent  date  and  were  still  being  ex- 
tended, Germany  believed  that  she  had  the  right  to  expect 
to  gain  a  position  equal  to  that  of  Great  Britain  at  Hong- 
Kong,  of  France  in  Indo-China,  and  of  Russia  in  Man- 
churia. She  maintained  that  it  was  as  necessary  for  her 
to  have  a  fortified  port  to  serve  as  a  naval  base  in  the  Pa- 
cific for  her  fleet  as  it  was  for  the  other  powers,  and  that  by 


GERMAN  WELTPOLITIK  (1883-1905)  201 

securing  a  foothold  on  the  Chinese  coast  she  would  be  in  a 
position  to  get  her  share  of  the  commerce  of  the  Far  East. 
From  1895  to  1897  Germany  carefully  examined  different 
points  that  might  serve  for  the  establishment  of  a  naval  and 
commercial  base.  At  the  beginning  of  1897  a  technical  mis- 
sion was  sent  out  to  China  whose  membership  included  the 
famous  Franzius,  the  creator  of  Kiel.  This  mission  re- 
ported in  favor  of  Kiau-chau  on  the  peninsula  of  Shantung. 
As  the  other  powers  were  preying  upon  China,  Germany 
knew  that  none  of  them  would  be  foolish  enough  to  put  in 
question  their  own  titles  by  opposing  her  scheme  openly. 
She  knew  also  that  there  would  be  no  concerted  diplomatic 
sujDport  of  China  in  resistance  to  her  demands.  For 
France  and  Russia  were  on  bad  terms  with  Great  Britain, 
and  they  had  been  partners  with  Germany  in  compelling 
Japan  to  revise  the  treaty  of  Shimonoseki  two  years 
earlier. 

The  murder  of  two  missionaries  in  the  interior  of  the 
coveted  province  on  November  1,  1897,  gave  Germany  her 
chance.  War-vessels  landed  on  the  peninsula  troops  who 
seized  Kiau-chau  and  Tsing-tau.  By  a  treaty  signed  on 
March  6, 1899,  Kiau-chau  wdth  adjacent  territory  was  leased 
to  Germany  for  ninety-nine  years.  The  German  capital  and 
commerce  were  given  preferential  rights  on  the  peninsula, 
together  with  a  concession  of  the  immediate  construction 
of  a  railway  and  exclusive  mining  privileges  along  the  rail- 
way line.  Thus  the  greater  part  of  the  province  of  Shan- 
tung, with  its  forty  million  inhabitants,  was  concerted  into 
a  German  sphere  of  influence. 

When  Germany  leased  Kiau-chau,  she  solemnly  declared 
that  the  port  would  be  open — ein  freir  Hafen  fur  alle  Na- 
tionen.  But  Japanese  trade  competition  soon  caused  her 
to  go  back  on  her  word.  In  1906  she  conceived  a  clever 
scheme  by  which  the  Chinese  duties  were  to  be  collected 
within  the  German  sphere  in  return  for  an  annual  sum  of 
twenty  per  cent,  of  the  total  customs  receipts  of  the  Tsing- 


202         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tau  district.  In  this  way  she  more  than  reimbursed  her- 
self— at  the  expense  of  the  Japanese — for  the  generosity 
displayed  in  allowing  German  goods  to  be  subject  to  the 
Chinese  customs. 

During  the  fifteen  years  of  German  control  the  leased 
territory  and  the  concessions  in  the  interior  of  Shantung 
brought  rich  material  returns  to  Germany.  Kiau-chau  was 
the  only  overseas  enterprise  that  paid.  But  the  Japanese 
felt  that  the  naval  base  was  as  much  of  a  menace  to  them  as 
Port  Arthur  in  Russian  hands  had  been,  and  there  was 
no  doubt  that  Germany  was  a  more  formidable  commercial 
competitor  than  Russia.  Great  Britain  also  felt  that  the 
presence  of  Germany  on  the  coast  of  China  was  a  potential 
menace  to  her  trade  and  maritime  supremacy.  Russia  and 
France  in  the  Far  East  she  had  not  feared  so  greatly. 
"While  the  immediate  result  of  the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance, 
concluded  three  years  after  the  lease  of  Shantung  to  Ger- 
many, was  to  make  possible  the  attack  of  Japan  upon  Rus- 
sia, it  ultimately  enabled  Japan  to  drive  Germany  also 
from  a  base  in  China  dangerously  near  her  own  coast. 

The  most  feasible  aspect  of  the  Weltpolitik  was  the  eco- 
nomic penetration  of  Asiatic  Turkey.  The  colonial  ven- 
tures in  Africa  and  Asia — notably  at  the  time  of  the  Her- 
ero  War  and  the  Boxer  Rebellion — were  bitterly  opposed 
by  many  Germans,  and  never  succeeded  in  firing  the  imagi- 
nation of  the  people.  But  the  Germans  have  always  been 
under  the  spell  of  the  Mediterranean.  Greece  and  Bible 
lands  and  the  countries  of  Islam  attract  northern  peoples 
in  a  peculiar  way.  The  Weltpolitik,  at  work  in  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  received  a  popular  indorsement  that  in  time  was 
extended  to  other  foreign  policies.  The  minarets  of  Con- 
stantinople and  Damascus  and  Bagdad,  glistening  in  the 
sun,  Jerusalem  the  golden  and  Mecca  the  mysterious,  the 
islands  of  the  ^gean  and  the  deserts  of  Arabia,  camels 
and  carpets,  Harun  al-Rashid  and  Suleiman  the  magnifi- 
cent— as  a  reader  of  the i[ Thousand  and  One  Nights"  would 


GERMAN  WELTPOLITIK  (1883-1905)  203 

fancy  them — here  we  have  the  psychological  background 
of  the  Drang  nach  Osten,  Germany's  "push  to  the  East" 
was  inspired  by  more  than  simple  economic  necessity,  and 
it  gradually  grew  into  a  movement  that  the  Germans  be- 
lieved to  be  a  matter  of  national  honor  as  well  as  national 
prosperity. 

The  certainty  of  economic  success  helped  to  make  worth 
while  the  political  effort  of  the  German  statesmen,  who 
knew  that  their  goal  could  be  achieved  only  by  attaining 
control  of  Austria-Hungary  and  the  Balkan  States.  Great 
Britain  had  an  unobstructed  path  to  Turkey  by  sea.  Eus- 
sia  was  a  neighbor  of  Turkey.  Predominant  influence  in 
the  Ottoman  Empire  would  be  advantageous  to  Germany 
only  if  she  were  able  to  assure  herself  of  a  land  route  to 
Turkey  that  could  not  be  cut  by  her  enemies.  Hence,  in 
considering  the  Weltpolitik  in  Turkey,  we  must  include 
the  relations  between  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary,  Ger- 
many and  the  Balkan  States,  Austria-Hungary  and  the 
Balkan  States,  Austria-Hungary  and  Russia,  and  Russia 
and  the  Balkan  States.  Unless  she  backed  Turkey  against 
the  Balkan  States  and  Austria-Hungary  against  Russia, 
her  position  in  Turkey  was  worth  nothing  to  Germany. 

In  1888  a  group  of  German  financiers,  underwritten  by 
the  Deutsche  Bank,  secured  the  concession  for  a  railway 
line  from  Ismid  to  Angora  in  Asia  Minor.  The  construc- 
tion of  this  line  was  followed  by  concessions  for  an  exten- 
sion from  Angora  to  Caesarea  and  a  branch  from  the  Ismid- 
Angora  line  running  southwest  from  Eski  Sheir  to  Konia. 
The  extension  to  Casarea  was  never  made.  That  was  not 
the  direction  in  which  the  Germans  wanted  to  go.  The 
branch  became  the  main  line.  Thus  was  bom  the  Berlin- 
Bagdad-Bassora  "all  rail  route."  The  Baltic  Sea  was  to 
be  connected  with  the  Persian  Gulf.  The  Balkan  penin- 
sula was  to  come  under  the  influence  of  Austria-Hungary, 
and  Asia  Minor  and  Mesopotamia  of  Germany.  The  south 
Slavs  and  the  peoples  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  were  to  be 


204         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

dispossessed.*  Russia  cut  off  from  the  Mediterranean, 
Germany  at  Constantinople,  France  checkmated  in  Syria, 
and  Great  Britain  in  Mesopotamia  and  Egypt — this  was  the 
pan-Germanic  conception  of  the  Bagdadbahn. 

The  first  railway  concession  granted  to  the  Germans  in 
Asia  Minor  coincided  with  the  accession  of  Kaiser  Wilhelm 
II,  who  in  the  next  year  (1889)  made  his  first  visit  to 
Sultan  Abdul  Hamid.  In  1898  a  second  visit  was  made, 
followed  by  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy  Land;  and  this  re- 
sulted in  the  granting  of  an  extension  of  the  original  Eski 
Sheir-Konia  concession  to  Bagdad  and  the  Persian  Gulf. 
This  revelation  of  Germany's  ambition  led  to  international 
intrigues  and  negotiations  for  a  share  in  the  construction 
of  the  line  through  Mesopotamia,  and  Germany  had  to  ac- 
cept international  participation  in  financing  the  project. 

Russia  did  not  realize  the  danger  of  German  influence  at 
Constantinople  or  foresee  the  eventualities  of  the  German 
** pacific  penetration"  in  Asia  Minor.  She  adjusted  the 
Macedonian  question  with  Austria-Hungary  at  Miirzsteg 
in  1903  in  order  to  have  a  free  hand  in  Manchuria,  Active 
opposition  to  Germany  in  the  Near  East  was  not  begun 
by  Petrograd  until  after  Russian  ambitions  in  the  Far 
East  had  been  shattered  through  the  war  with  Japan. 

The  situation  was  different  with  Great  Britain.  The 
menace  of  the  German  approach  to  the  Persian  Gulf  was 
brought  to  the  attention  of  the  British  Foreign  Office  be- 
fore the  Boer  crisis  became  acute,  and  it  was  noted  that, 
while  Germany  had  sent  engineers  along  the  proposed  route 
of  her  railway,  she  had  neglected  the  fact  that  the  sheik 
of  Koweit,  who  ruled  the  projected  terminus  on  the  Persian 
Gulf,  was  virtually  independent  of  Turkey.  In  1899  Colonel 
Meade,  the  British  resident  of  the  Persian  Gulf,  signed 
with  the  sheik  of  Koweit  a  secret  convention  that  assured 
to  the  latter  ** special  protection"  if  he  would  make  no 

^  Ernst  Haeckel  actually  prophesied  this  in  a  speech  in  1905  before  the 
Geographical  Society  of  Jena. 


GERMAN  WELTPOLITIK  (1883-1905)  205 

cession  of  territory  without  the  knowledge  and  consent  of 
the  British  government.  Some  months  later,  when  a  Ger- 
man mission,  headed  by  the  kaiser's  consul-general  at  Con- 
stantinople, arrived  in  Koweit  to  arrange  the  concession 
for  the  terminus  of  the  Bagdadhalm,  they  found  a  recalci- 
trant sheik  who  refused  to  recognize  the  sultan 's  authority. 
A  Turkish  war-ship  arrived.  But  British  war-ships  and 
blue-jackets  upheld  the  independence  of  Koweit.  This 
event  was  the  beginning  of  a  series  of  conflicts  in  foreign 
policies  that  changed  the  British  and  German  peoples  from 
friends  to  foes. 

From  1888  to  1905  the  increase  of  German  economic  in- 
terests in  the  Ottoman  Empire  was  rapid.  But,  as  we  have 
seen  in  the  case  of  Koweit,  politically  Germany  did  not 
have  things  her  own  way.  British  opposition  developed  in 
regard  to  other  concessions  in  Mesopotamia,  and  the  at- 
tempts of  Geraian  merchants  and  shippers  to  get  a  share  of 
the  river  traffic  and  of  the  ocean  freights  from  Bassora 
were  bitterly  resisted. 

From  Mesopotamia  to  Persia  was  but  a  step.  Germany 
began  to  think  about  railways  and  banks  and  markets  in  the 
shah's  dominions.  It  was  to  her  interest  that  Persia  re- 
main independent,  so  that  she  could  get  a  share  of  conces- 
sions and  trade.  But,  rather  than  let  Germany  in,  Russia 
and  Great  Britain  made  an  agreement  to  divide  Persia 
into  spheres  of  influence.^  In  Morocco,  the  only  other  in- 
dependent Moslem  country.  Great  Britain  worked  mth 
Germany  for  some  years  to  prevent  France  from  monopo- 
lizing the  country.  But  the  British  so  greatly  feared  the 
growth  of  German  commercial  activities  in  the  Near  East 
that  they  decided  to  compound  their  colonial  rivalry  with 
France,  and  this  necessitated  abandoning  opposition  to 
France  in  Morocco.-  During  the  first  decade  of  the  twen- 
tieth century  Germany  found  her  influence  in  the  Ottoman 

*See  Chapter  XIV. 

'  There  were,  of  course,  other  important  considerations  that  made  advisable 
the  Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904.     See  Chapter  XV. 


206  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Empire  limited  by  the  diplomatic  manoeuvers  of  other 
powers,  and  saw  fail  her  attempt  to  prevent  Morocco  and 
Persia  from  being  included  in  the  spheres  of  influence  of 
rival  powers  by  agreements  made  among  themselves,  to 
which  Germany  was  not  a  party  and  for  which  she  received 
no  compensation. 

German  statesmen  did  not  give  up  their  efforts  to  find 
'  *  a  place  in  the  sun. ' '  But  they  began  to  pay  more  attention 
to  strengthening  the  cultural  bonds  between  the  fatherland 
and  Germans  in  exile ;  to  liberating  merchants  and  manu- 
facturers from  dependence  upon  foreign  carriers  for  goods 
and  raw  materials ;  and,  above  all,  to  developing  an  army 
and  navy  that  would  give  Germany  the  prestige  and  power 
she  missed  through  her  lack  of  extensive  colonial  dominions, 
well  distributed  along  trade  routes  and  varied  in  potential 
wealth. 


CHAPTER  XVn 

THE  FEANCO-GERMAN  DISPUTE  OVER  MOROCCO    (1905-1911) 

IN  the  decade  from  1904  to  1914  Morocco  was  ''taken 
over"  by  France,  but  not  until  Europe  had  been  led 
from  one  international  crisis  through  another  to  the  catas- 
trophe of  a  world  war. 

Unless  the  nature  of  sovereignty  in  the  shereefian  em- 
pire is  kept  in  mind,  one  can  not  understand  recent  events 
in  Morocco.  There  are  three  differences  between  the 
Moroccan  conception  of  the  state  and  ours:  (1)  The  sul- 
tan's authority  depends  upon  his  recognition  by  other  re- 
ligious chiefs  who  are,  like  himself,  descendants  of  the 
Prophet.  There  is  a  traditional  right  of  blood  but  not  of 
primogeniture.  (2)  The  state  is  not  a  geographical  con- 
ception. The  sultan  rules  over  tribes,  not  over  territories. 
(3)  Some  of  the  tribes  have  never  recognized  the  sultan's 
authority.  Morocco  is  divided  into  two  distinct  camps :  the 
Makhzen  (tribes  that  recognize  the  sultan's  authority) 
and  the^  Siba  (tribes  that  are  not  vassals  of  the  sultan). 
The  Makhzen  and  the  Siba  are  neighbors  in  every  part  of 
the. country. 

Since  there  is  no  united  people  under  a  ruler  who  has 
administrative  control  of  definitely  delimited  territories, 
we  see  how  absurd  was  the  Anglo-German  contention  that 
Morocco  must  not  ''lose  her  independence,"  and  the  French 
contention  that  the  sultan  was  responsible  for  the  actions  of 
all  the  tribes  within  the  region  our  maps  call  Morocco.  Be- 
fore the  British  made  the  agreement  of  1904  with  France, 
the  sultan  could  play  off  one  power  against  another,  and  his 
anomalous  "government"  was  allowed  to  exist.  When 
France  got  a  free  hand,  and  Great  Britain  stood  behind  her 

207 


208         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

by  preventing  Germany  from  assuming  the  traditional  role 
England  herself  had  been  playing,  the  sultan  was  brought 
face  to  face  for  the  first  time  with  the  necessity  of  repre- 
senting geographical  Morocco.  He  was  asked  to  accept  re- 
sponsibility for  and  to  act  in  the  name  of  tribes  that  had 
never  recognized  his  or  his  ancestors'  authority. 

The  Moroccan  crisis  began  in  1901  with  the  occupation 
by  French  troops  of  the  oasis  of  Twat,  on  the  northern 
edge  of  the  Sahara  Desert  in  the  undefined  hinterland  be- 
tween Morocco  and  Algeria.  The  French  were  planning  to 
establish  lines  of  communication  across  the  Sahara  to  their 
colonies  of  the  Niger  and  the  Senegal.  These  lines  had  to 
be  protected  from  raiding  tribes.  It  was  also  necessary, 
owing  to  the  rapid  development  of  Algeria  and  Tunisia,  to 
bring  under  administrative  control  the  Algerian  hinterland. 
The  French  attitude  towards  Morocco  was  logical  and  not 
unreasonable.  What  France  asked  for  she  had  the  right 
to  expect — that  the  sultan  of  Morocco  should  exercise 
authority  over  the  tribes  that  were  threatening  the  secur- 
ity and  disturbing  the  prosperity  of  Oran,  the  Algerian 
province  bordering  on  Morocco,  or  would  refrain  from  op- 
posing France  in  taking  the  necessary  military  measures 
to  reduce  the  Moorish  tribes  to  order.  The  French  declared 
that  if  Morocco  meant  a  definite  geographical  territory  the 
Fez  government  was  responsible  for  what  happened  in  that 
territory.  If  the  sultan  made  the  plea  that  he  was  respon- 
sible only  for  the  acts  of  the  Maklizen  (i.  e.,  the  submitted 
tribes),  France  was  not  attacking  his  sovereignty  or  his 
government  when  she  punished  the  Siba  [i.  e.,  unsubmitted 
tribes)  and  occupied  their  lands. 

The  difiiculty  of  France  lay  not  so  much  with  Abdul  Aziz 
and  his  native  advisers  as  with  the  British  and  German 
ministers  at  Tangier,  and  Kaid  Maclean,  the  instructor- 
general  of  the  Moorish  army,  a  Scotch  adventurer  subsi- 
dized by  the  British  Foreign  Office.  As  long  as  these  three 
men  kept  telUng  Abdul  Aziz  that  it  was  his  duty  and  right 


FRANCO-GERMAN  DISPUTE    OVER  MOROCCO     209 

to  reject  the  French  thesis,  France  could  be  put  before  the 
world — even  before  her  own  people — in  the  light  of  an  ag- 
gressor, trying  to  bully  the  sovereign  of  the  one  remaining 
independent  Mohammedan  state  of  Africa.  The  agreement 
of  1904  eliminated  the  British,  left  the  French  and  Ger- 
mans direct  antagonists,  and  deprived  the  sultan  of  his 
most  powerful  support  against  France. 

A  mission  was  sent  at  the  beginning  of  1905  to  Fez  to 
urge  upon  the  sultan  a  scheme  of  reforming  Morocco,  in 
which  France  would  be  the  adviser  and  ''elder  brother"  of 
the  sultan.  The  Berber  tribes,  incensed  against  France  for 
having  extended  her  aggression  from  Twat  into  the  'Figig 
region,  refused  to  obey  a  summons  from  Abdul  Aziz  to 
attend  a  divan  to  ''discuss  the  French  proposals."  They 
warned  Abdul  Aziz  against  listening  to  the  treacherous 
words  of  the  infidel.  Most  of  the  religious  and  tribal  chiefs, 
however,  assembled  at  Fez.  The  divan,  like  all  Oriental  as- 
semblies, was  convoked  for  the  purpose  of  assenting  with- 
out discussion  to  the  conclusion  put  before  it  by  the  gov- 
ernment. 

At  this  moment  occurred  the  first  German  intervention. 
Germany  was  not  a  party  to  the  Anglo-French  agreement. 
She  had  no  reason,  then,  to  give  up  suddenly,  as  Great 
Britain  had  done,  her  interest  in  preserving  the  political 
and  territorial  integrity  of  Morocco.  On  March  31,  1905, 
Kaiser  Wilhelm  landed  at  Tangier,  sent  greetings  to  Ab- 
dul Aziz,  and  let  it  be  known  that  he  regarded  Morocco  as 
an  independent  country  and  intended,  in  spite  of  the  Eng- 
lish defection,  to  continue  to  support  the  sultan  against  in- 
trigues that  were  threatening  to  destroy  him  and  his  coun- 
try. The  kaiser's  visit  to  Morocco  was  for  only  two  hours, 
but  it  gave  Abdul  Aziz  and  his  ministers  courage  to  resist 
the  demands  of  the  French  mission.  On  May  28  the  sul- 
tan formally  rejected  the  French  proposals,  referring  to 
the  decision  of  the  divan  as  the  ground  of  their  non  pos- 
sumus. 


210         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

The  government  of  the  Makhzen,  accepting  the  sugges- 
tion of  the  German  minister,  proposed  an  international 
conference  of  all  the  powers  to  decide  upon  the  status  of 
Morocco  before  the  world.  The  British  Foreign  Ofifice  re- 
fused to  accept  the  conference  unless  France  were  willing. 
M.  Delcasse  strongly  advised  the  French  cabinet  to  refuse 
the  proposal  for  a  conference,  no  matter  what  might  happen. 
His  colleagues,  however,  fearing  a  war  mth  Germany,  for 
which  they  were  not  prepared  and  on  an  issue  that  was 
not  clear  to  their  own  electorate,  much  less  to  the  world, 
could  not  bring  themselves  to  follow  the  foreign  minister's 
advice.  M.  Delcasse  resigned.  This  was  the  beginning  of 
the  actual  gathering  of  the  war  clouds  that  were  to  break  a 
decade  later. 

The  conference  was  first  set  for  Tangier,  after  long  ne- 
gotiations between  the  powers  and  Morocco.  During  these 
negotiations  Abdul  Aziz  borrowed  two  and  a  half  million 
dollars  from  German  financiers,  and  gave  to  German  con- 
tractors the  concession  for  harbor  work  at  Tangier.  Bu 
Hamara,  a  pretender,  continued  his  war  against  the  sultan, 
and  it  was  believed  that  he  might — perhaps  with  the  con- 
nivance of  the  Makhzen — make  some  coup  that  would  up- 
set European  calculations  before  the  conference  met.  The 
Oriental  delay  of  the  Moors  caused  the  postponement  of 
the  conference,  and  Bu  Hamara 's  activity  a  change  of  its 
place  of  meeting. 

On  January  17,  1906,  a  conference  of  European  states, 
to  which  the  United  States  of  America  was  admitted,  met 
at  Algeciras  to  decide  the  international  status  of  Morocco. 
For  some  time  the  attitude  of  the  German  delegates  was  un- 
compromising. They  maintained  the  kaiser's  thesis  as  set 
forth  at  Tangier:  the  complete  independence  of  Morocco. 
But  they  finally  yielded,  and  acknowledged  the  right  of 
France  and  Spain  to  organize  in  Morocco  an  international 
police. 

The  convention  was  signed  on  April  7.    It  provided  for : 


FRANCO-GERMAN   DISPUTE   OVER  MOROCCO     211 

(1)  police  under  the  sovereign  authority  of  the  sultan,  re- 
cruited from  Moorish  moslems,  and  distributed  in  the  eight 
open  ports;  (2)  Spanish  and  French  officers,  placed  at  his 
disposal  by  their  governments,  to  assist  the  sultan;  (3) 
limitation  of  the  total  effective  of  this  police  force  from 
two  thousand  to  two  thousand  five  hundred,  of  French  and 
Spanish  officers,  commissioned  sixteen  to  twenty,  and  non- 
commissioned thirty  to  forty,  appointed  for  five  years; 
(4)  an  inspector-general,  a  high  officer  of  the  Swiss  army, 
chosen  subject  to  the  approval  of  the  sultan,  with  resi- 
dence at  Tangier;  (5)  a  State  Bank  of  Morocco,  in  which 
each  of  the  signatory  powers  had  the  right  to  subscribe 
capital;  (6)  tlie  right  of  foreigners  to  acquire  property, 
and  to  build  upon  it,  in  any  part  of  Morocco;  (7)  France's 
exclusive  right  to  enforce  regulations  in  the  frontier  region 
of  Algeria  and  a  similar  right  to  Spain  in  the  frontier 
region  of  Spain;  (8)  the  preservation  of  the  public  services 
of  the  empire  from  alienation  for  private  interests. 

Chancellor  von  Biilow  's  speech  in  the  Reichstag  on  April 
5,  1906,  was  a  justification  of  Germany's  attitude.  He  de- 
clared that  the  policy  of  Willielmstrasse  had  been  far  from 
bellicose  and  that  Germany 's  demands  were  altogether  rea- 
sonable. The  time  had  come,  declared  the  chancellor,  when 
German  interests  in  the  remaining  independent  portions 
of  Africa  and  Asia  must  be  considered  by  Europe.  In 
going  to  Tangier  and  in  forcing  the  conference  of  Algeciras, 
Germany  had  laid  down  the  principle  that  there  must  be 
equal  opportunities  for  Germans  in  independent  countries, 
and  had  demonstrated  that  she  was  prepared  to  enforce  this 
principle. 

When  one  considers  the  remarkable  growth  in  popula- 
tion and  the  industrial  and  maritime  evolution  of  Ger- 
many, this  attitude  can  not  be  wondered  at,  much  less  con- 
demned. Germany,  deprived  of  fruitful  colonies  by  her 
late  entrance  among  nations,  was  finding  it  necessary  to 
adopt  and  uphold  the  policy  of  trying  to  prevent  the  pre- 


212         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

emption,  for  the  benefit  of  her  rivals,  of  those  parts  of  the 
world  that  were  still  free. 

Neither  France  nor  Spain  had  any  feeling  of  loyalty 
towards  the  convention  of  Algeciras.  However  much  may 
have  been  written  to  prove  this  loyalty,  the  facts  of  the  few 
years  following  Algeciras  are  convincing.  After  1908 
Spain,  provoked  and  led  on  by  the  tremendous  expenditures 
entailed  upon  her  by  the  Eiff  campaigns,  began  to  consider 
the  region  of  Morocco  in  which  she  was  installed  as  exclu- 
sively Spanish  territory.  French  writers  have  expended 
much  energy  and  ingenuity  in  proving  the  disinterested- 
ness of  French  efforts  to  enforce  loyally  the  decisions  of 
Algeciras.  But  there  has  never  been  a  moment  that  France 
did  not  dream  of  the  completion  of  the  vast  colonial  empire 
in  north  Africa  by  the  inclusion  of  Morocco.  It  has  been 
the  goal  towards  which  all  her  military  and  civil  admin- 
istrations in  Algeria  and  the  Sahara  have  been  working. 
To  bring  about  the  downfall  of  the  sultan's  authority,  not 
only  press  campaigns  were  undertaken,  but  anarchy  on 
the  Algerian  frontier  was  allowed  to  go  on  unchecked  until 
military  measures  seemed  justifiable. 

In  a  similar  way,  the  German  colonists  of  Morocco  did 
their  best  to  bring  about  another  intervention  by  Germany. 
Their  methods  were  so  despicable  and  outrageous  that 
they  had  frequently  to  be  disavowed  officially.  In  1910  the 
German  Foreign  Office  found  the  claims  of  Mannesmann 
Brothers  to  certain  mining  privileges  invalid  because  they 
did  not  fulfil  the  requirements  of  the  act  of  Algeciras.  But 
the  Mannesmann  mining  group,  as  well  as  other  German 
enterprises  in  Morocco,  were  secretly  encouraged  to  make 
all  the  trouble  they  could  for  the  French  while  defending 
the  authority  of  the  sultan.  The  Casablanca  incident  is 
only  one  of  numerous  affronts  that  the  French  were  asked 
to  swallow. 

In  the  spring  of  1911  it  was  realized  everywhere  in  Eu- 
rope that  the  sultan's  authority  was  even  less  than  it  had 


FRANCO-GERMAN   DISPUTE   OVER  MOROCCO     213 

been  in  1905.  The  Berber  tribes  were  in  arms  on  all  sides. 
In  March  accounts  began  to  appear  of  danger  at  Fez,  not 
only  to  European  residents,  but  also  to  the  sultan.  The 
reports  of  the  French  consul,  and  the  telegrams  of  corre- 
spondents of  two  Paris  newspapers,  were  most  alarming. 
On  April  2  it  was  announced  that  the  Berber  tribes  had 
actually  attacked  the  city  and  were  besieging  it.  Every- 
thing was  prepared  for  the  final  act  of  the  drama. 

A  relief  column  of  native  troops  under  Major  Bremond 
arrived  in  Fez  on  April  26.  The  next  day,  an  urgent  mes- 
sage for  relief  having  been  received  from  Colonel  Mangin 
in  Fez,  Colonel  Brulard  started  for  the  capital  mth  another 
column.  Without  waiting  for  further  word,  a  French 
army,  which  had  been  carefully  prepared  for  the  purpose, 
entered  Morocco  under  General  Moinier.  On  May  21  Fez 
was  occupied  by  the  French.  They  found  that  all  was  well 
there  with  the  Europeans  and  with  the  natives.  But,  for- 
tunately for  the  French  plans,  Muley  Hafid's  brother  had 
set  himself  up  at  Mequinez  as  pretender  to  the  throne.  The 
sultan  could  now  retain  his  sovereignty  only  by  putting 
himself  under  the  protection  of  the  French  army.  Morocco 
had  lost  her  independence. 

Germany  made  no  objection  to  the  French  expeditionary 
corps  in  April.  She  certainly  did  not  expect  the  quick  suc- 
cession of  events  in  May  that  brought  her  face  to  face  with 
the  fait  accompli  of  a  strong  French  armj^  in  Fez.  As  soon 
as  it  was  realized  at  Berlin  that  the  fiction  of  Moroccan 
independence  had  been  so  skilfully  terminated,  France  was 
asked  ''what  compensation  she  would  give  to  Germany  in 
return  for  a  free  hand  in  Morocco."  The  pourparlers 
dragged  on  through  several  weeks  in  June.  France  refused 
to  acknowledge  any  ground  for  compensation  to  Germany. 
She  maintained  that  the  recent  action  in  Morocco  had  been 
at  the  request  of  the  sultan  and  that  it  was  a  matter  en- 
tirely between  him  and  France. 

Germany  saw  that  a  bold  stroke  was  necessary.     On  July 


214  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

1  the  gunboat  Panther  went  to  Agadir,  a  port  on  the  Atlan- 
tic coast  of  Morocco.  To  Great  Britain  and  to  France,  the 
despatch  of  the  Panther  was  represented  as  due  to  the 
necessity  of  protecting  German  interests,  seeing  that  there 
was  anarchy  in  that  part  of  Morocco.  But  the  German 
newspapers,  even  those  that  were  supposed  to  have  official 
relations  with'Wilhelmstrasse,  spoke  as  if  a  demand  for  the 
cession  of  Mogador  or  some  other  portion  of  Morocco  were 
contemplated.  The  chancellor  explained  to  the  Reichstag 
that  the  sending  of  the  Panther  was  ''to  show -the  world 
that  Germany  was  firmly  resolved  not  to  be  pushed  to 
one  side." 

But  in  the  negotiations  through  the  German  ambassador 
in  Paris  it  was  clear  that  Germany  was  playing  a  game  of 
political  blackmail.  The  German  Foreign  Office  shifted 
its  claims  from  Morocco  to  concessions  in  central  Africa. 
On  July  15  it  asked  for  the  whole  of  the  French  Congo  from 
the  sea  to  the  River  Sanga,  and  a  renunciation  in  Ger- 
many's favor  of  France's  contingent  claims  to  the  succes- 
sion of  the  Belgian  Congo.  The  reason  given  for  this 
demand  was  that  if  Morocco  were  to  pass  under  a  French 
protectorate  it  was  only  just  that  compensation  should  be 
given  to  Germany  elsewhere.  France,  for  the  moment, 
hesitated.  She  definitely  refused  to  entertain  the  idea  of 
compensation  as  soon  as  she  had  received  the  assurance  of 
the  aid  of  Great  Britain  in  supporting  her  against  the 
German  claims. 

On  July  1  the  German  ambassador  had  notified  Sir  Ed- 
ward Grey  of  the  despatch  of  the  Panther  to  Agadir  ''in 
response  to  the  demand  for  protection  from  German  firms 
there,"  and  explained  that  Germany  considered  the  ques- 
tion of  Morocco  reopened  by  the  French  occupation  of  Fez, 
and  thought  that  it  would  be  possible  to  make  an  agree- 
ment with  Spain  and  France  for  the  partition  of  Morocco, 
On  July  4  Sir  Edward  Grey,  after  a  consultation  with  the 
cabinet,  answered  that  Great  Britain  could  recognize  no 


FRANCO-GERMAN  DISPUTE   OVER  MOROCCO      215 

change  in  Morocco  without  consulting  France,  to  whom 
she  was  bound  by  treaty.  The  ambassador  then  explained 
that  his  government  would  not  consider  the  reopening  of 
the  question  in  a  European  conference,  that  it  was  a  matter 
directly  between  Germany  and  France,  and  that  his  over- 
ture to  Sir  Edward  Grey  had  been  merely  in  the  nature  of 
a  friendly  explanation. 

Germany  believed  that  the  constitutional  crisis  in  Great 
Britain  was  so  serious  that  the  hands  of  the  Liberal  cabinet 
would  be  tied,  and  that  they  would  not  be  so  foolhardy  as 
to  back  up  France  at  the  moment  when  they  themselves 
were  being  so  bitterly  assailed  by  the  most  influential  ele- 
ments of  the  British  electorate  on  the  question  of  limiting 
the  veto  power  of  the  House  of  Lords.  It  was  in  this  belief 
that  Germany  on  July  15  asked  for  territorial  cessions  from 
France  in  central  Africa.  Wilhelmstrasse  thought  the  mo- 
ment well  chosen  and  that  there  was  every  hope  of  success. 

But  the  German  mentality  has  never  seemed  to  appre- 
ciate the  frequent  lesson  of  history  that  the  British  people 
are  able  to  distinguish  clearly  between  matters  of  internal 
and  external  policy.  Bitterly  assailed  as  a  traitor  to  his 
country  because  he  advocates  certain  changes  of  laws,  a 
British  cabinet  minister  can  still  be  conscious  of  the  fact 
that  his  bitterest  opponents  will  rally  around  him  when  he 
takes  a  stand  on  a  matter  of  foreign  policy.  This  knowl- 
edge of  admirable  national  solidarity  enabled  Mr.  Lloyd 
George  on  July  21,  the  very  day  on  which  the  king  gave  his 
consent  to  the  creation  of  new  peers  to  bring  the  House 
of  Lords  to  reason,  at  a  Mansion  House  banquet,  to  warn 
Germany  against  the  danger  of  pressing  her  demands  upon 
France.  The  effect,  both  in  London  and  Paris,  was  to 
unify  and  strengthen  resistance. 

Since  the  visit  of  the  kaiser  in  Tangier  in  1905,  the  Brit- 
ish people  had  come  to  look  upon  Germany,  instead  of  upon 
France  or  Russia,  as  the  next  enemy.  They  felt  that  Ger- 
many, by  the  creation  of  the  "High  Seas  Fleet,"  was  pre- 


216         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

paring  for  war.  In  the  competitive  building  of  naval  war- 
vessels  the  British  knew  that  they  were  bound  to  fall  behind 
if  they  attempted  to  carry  out  their  "two  keels  to  one" 
policy.  A  feeling  of  public  sympathy  for  France,  which 
the  press  had  been  fostering  ever  since  the  consummation 
of  the  agreement  of  1904,  was  strengthened  by  the  unsuc- 
cessful attempt,  made  in  1908,  by  British  statesmen  to  come 
to  a  naval  agreement  with  Germany,  on  the  basis,  of  course, 
of  the  acknowledgment  of  British  supremacy.  Taxes  due 
to  the  race  in  naval  building  were  increasingly  heavy,  and 
British  public  opinion  had  begun  to  regard  France  as  a 
friend  to  be  cultivated  and  supported  against  Germany. 

But  the  ways  of  diplomacy  are  tortuous.  Throughout 
August  and  September  Germany  blustered  and  threatened. 
In  September  events  happened  to  embarrass  Eussia  and  tie 
her  hands,  as  in  the  first  Moroccan  imbroglio  of  1905. 
Premier  Stolypiu  was  assassinated  at  Kiev  on  September 
14;  the  United  States  denounced  her  commercial  treaty 
with  Russia  because  of  the  question  of  Jewish  passports; 
and  the  Shuster  affair  in  Persia  was  occupying  the  serious 
attention  of  Russian  diplomacy.  Had  it  not  been  for  the 
loyal  and  scrupulous  attitude  of  the  British  government 
towards  Russia  in  the  Persian  question,  Germany  might 
have  been  tempted  to  force  the  issue  with  France. 

German  demands  grew  more  moderate,  but  were  not 
abandoned.  For  members  of  the  House  of  Commons,  of 
the  extreme  Radical  mng  in  the  Liberal  party,  began  to 
put  the  British  government  in  an  uncomfortable  position. 
Militarism,  entangling  alliances  with  a  continental  power, 
the  necessity  for  agreement  with  Germany — these  were  the 
subjects  that  found  their  way  from  the  floor  of  the  House 
to  the  public  press.  A  portion  of  the  Liberal  party  that 
had  to  be  reckoned  with  believed  that  Germany  ought  not 
to  have  been  left  out  of  the  Anglo-French  agreement.  So 
serious  was  the  dissatisfaction  that  the  government  deemed 
it  necessary  to  make  an  explanation  to  the  House.     Sir 


FRANCO-GERMAN   DISPUTE    OVER  MOROCCO      217 

Edward  Grey  explained  and  defended  the  action  of  the 
cabinet  in  supporting  the  resistance  of  France  to  Ger- 
many's claims.  The  whole  history  of  the  negotiation  was 
revealed.  The  Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904  was  pub- 
lished for  the  first  time,  and  it  was  seen  that  this  agree- 
ment did  not  commit  Great  Britain  to  backing  France  by 
force  of  arms. 

Uncertainty  of  British  support  made  France  consent  to 
treat  with  Germany  on  the  Moroccan  question.  Two  agree- 
ments were  signed.  By  the  first,  Germany  recognized  the 
French  protectorate  in  Morocco,  subject  to  the  adhesion 
of  the  signers  of  the  convention  of  Algeciras,  and  waived 
her  right  to  take  part  in  the  negotiations  concerning  Moroc- 
can spheres  of  influence  between  Spain  and  France.  On 
her  side,  France  agreed  to  maintain  the  open  door  in 
Morocco,  and  to  refrain  from  any  measures  that  would 
hinder  the  legitimate  extension  of  German  commercial  and 
mining  interests.  By  the  second  agreement  France  ceded 
to  German}",  in  return  for  German  cessions,  certain  terri- 
tories that  were  added  to  southern  and  eastern  Kamerun, 
and  that  brought  the  Kamerun  frontier  in  two  places  to 
the  Congo  River.  It  was  a  "mutilation,"  as  the  French 
called  it,  of  their  equatorial  Africa. 

There  was  a  stormy  parliamentary  and  newspaper  dis- 
cussion, both  in  France  and  Germany,  over  these  two 
treaties.  None  was  satisfied.  The  treaties  were  finally 
ratified,  but  under  protest. 

In  France  the  ministry  was  subject  to  severe  criticism. 
There  was  also  some  feeling  of  bitterness — perhaps  a  reac- 
tion from  the  satisfaction  over  Mr.  Lloyd  George's  Man- 
sion House  speech — in  the  uncertainty  of  Great  Britain's 
support,  as  revealed  by  the  November  discussions  in  the 
House  of  Commons.  This  uncertainty  remained,  as  far  as 
French  pubHc  opinion  went,  until  Great  Britain  actually 
declared  war  upon  Germany  in  August,  1914. 

In  Germany  the  Beichstag  debates  revealed  the  belief 


218         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

that  the  Agadir  expedition  had,  in  the  final  analysis,  re- 
sulted in  a  fiasco.  An  astonishing  amount  of  enmity 
against  Great  Britain  was  displayed.  It  was  when  Herr 
Heydebrand  made  a  bitter  speech  against  Great  Britain, 
and  denounced  the  pacific  attitude  of  the  German  govern- 
ment, in  the  Eeichstag  session  of  November  10,  that  the 
crown  prince  made  public  his  position  in  German  foreign 
policy  by  applauding  loudly. 

The  aftermath  of  Agadir,  as  far  as  it  affected  Morocco, 
resulted  in  the  establishment  of  the  French  protectorate 
on  March  30,  1912.  The  sultan  signed  away  his  indepen- 
dence by  the  treaty  of  Fez.  Foreign  legations  at  Fez 
ceased  to  exist,  although  diplomatic  officials  were  retained 
at  Tangier.  France  voted  the  maintenance  of  forty  thou- 
sand troops  in  Morocco  "for  the  purposes  of  pacification." 
The  last  complications  disappeared  when,  on  November 
27,  a  Franco-Spanish  treaty  was  signed  at  Madrid,  in  which 
the  Spanish  zones  in  Morocco  were  defined  and  both  states 
promised  not  to  erect  fortifications  or  strategic  works  on 
the  Moroccan  coast. 

The  aftermath  of  Agadir  in  France  and  Germany  was 
an  increase  in  navahand  military  armaments,  and  the  crea- 
tion of  a  spirit  of  tension  that  needed  only  the  three  years 
of  war  in  the  Ottoman  Empire  to  bring  about  the  inevitable 
clash  between  Teuton  and  Gaul. 


FRENCH  CESSIONS  TO  GERMANY  IN  THE  CONGO:   1912 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE  YOUNG  TURK  EEVOLUTION  AND  ITS  REACTIONS 
(1908-1911) 

ON  July  24,  1908,  Sultan  Abdul  Hamid  was  compelled 
by  the  defection  of  his  army  to  yield  to  the  demand 
of  the  Young  Turks  to  resuscitate  the  constitution  of  1876, 
which  had  been  in  abeyance  for  more  than  thirty  years. ^ 
In  their  movement  for  constitutional  government  the  Young 
Turks  worked  against  insuperable  odds  until  they  were 
able  to  win  over  to  their  cause  high  officials,  civilian  and 
military,  by  demonstrating  that  the  continuance  of  des- 
potic and  irresponsible  government  would  entail  the  speedy 
disintegration  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  Like  all  other 
Oriental  countries,  Turkey  was  being  preyed  upon  by  the 
powers,  for  the  simple  reason  that  misrule  and  corruption 
made  her  too  weak  to  resist  political  intrigues  and  economic 
pressure  from  outside  that  were  gradually  diminishing 
her  authority  and  sovereignty.  The  Young  Turks  argued 
that  representative  government,  and  that  alone,  would 
bring  about  the  regeneration  of  their  country.  The  salva- 
tion of  Turkey,  they  declared,  depended  upon  instilling  into 
the  various  elements  of  the  empire  the  belief  that  a  con- 
stitutional regime,  in  which  all  would  have  a  voice,  meant 
security  of  life  and  property  and  economic  well-being 
for  all. 

The  idea  was  excellent,  and  all  Europe  hoped  that  it 
would  work  out  successfully.  The  greatest  danger  to  the 
peace  of  Europe  had  been  a  weak  Turkey,  unable  to  take 
care  of  herself,  and  it  was  assumed  that  a  strong  and  pros- 

*  See  pp.  100-101. 

219 


220  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

perous  Turkey,  able  to  resist  all  aggressors  and  pay  her 
obligations,  would  remove  from  international  relations 
trouble-breeding  problems.  No  European  statesman  be- 
lieved that  his  country  would  ever  be  allowed  by  the  other 
powers  a  free  hand  to  dominate  and  exploit  Turkey.  There- 
fore complications  and  embarrassments  arising  from  the 
constant  demands  for  intervention  by  bankers  and  humani- 
tarians to  protect  investments  and  oppressed  Christians 
could  be  avoided  if  Turkey  reformed  herself  and  became  a 
constitutional  state.  The  failure  of  the  Young  Turk  regime 
can  not  be  laid  at  the  door  of  European  statesmen,  who  had 
eyerj  reason  for  wanting  the  experiment  to  succeed. 

But  the  heritage  of  the  past  was  too  strong  to  be  over- 
come. The  Young  Turks  had  to  bear  the  consequences  of 
the  policies  of  the  old  regime,  and  of  their  own  folly  in 
assuming  and  acting  upon  three  false  assumptions:  (1) 
that  the  parts  of  the  empire  that  had  freed  themselves 
from  the  control  of  Constantinople  or  had  never  been  gov- 
erned except  nominally  by  the  sultan  would  surrender  their 
privileged  position  for  the  as  yet  unproved  benefits  of  the 
constitution;  (2)  that  a  Mohammedan  theocracy  could  be 
reconciled  with  European  political  and  judicial  institu- 
tions; and  (3)  that  the  Turkish  element  would  continue, 
under  the  changed  conditions,  to  be  able  to  dominate  the 
other  elements. 

From  the  first  day  of  the  revolution  the  Young  Turks 
announced  their  intention  of  doing  away  mth  the  agree- 
ments and  decrees  by  which  outlying  provinces  had  been 
granted  autonomy  or  were  temporarily  administered  by 
other  powers.  Since  Turkey  now  had  a  constitution,  which 
guaranteed  equal  rights  to  all,  there  could  be  no  vaUd  ex- 
cuse for  a  special  status  for  any  part  of  the  empire,  and 
so  all  provinces  would  be  expected  to  return  to  the  "mother 
country"  and  resume  their  old  place  in  the  Ottoman  family. 
This  poUcy  would  mean  the  restoration  to  Turkey  of  Bos- 
nia, Herzegovina,  and  the  Sanjak  of  Novibazar  by  Austria- 


THE  YOUNG  TURK  REVOLUTION  (1908-1911)  221 

Hungary,  of  Cyprus  and  Egj-pt  by  Great  Britain ;  the  loss 
by  the  Cretans  of  their  virtual  independence;  and  would 
bring  into  question  the  autonomy  of  Bulgaria.  The  Young 
Turks  did  not  have  to  wait  long  to  discover  that  the  resus- 
citation of  the  constitution,  thus  interpreted,  meant  the 
opposite  of  what  they  had  planned.  Austria-Hungary  an- 
nexed Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  which  she  had  been  holding 
since  the  Congress  of  Berlin;  Bulgaria  proclaimed  her 
independence  and  Prince  Ferdinand  was  crowned  king  at 
Timova,  seat  of  the  ancient  Bulgarian  czars;  and  the 
Cretan  assembly  decreed  the  union  of  Crete  with  Greece 
and  took  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  King  George.  Although 
there  was  some  effervescence  in  Cyprus,  its  object  was 
annexation  to  Greece  and  not  return  to  Turkey;  while  the 
Egyptians  made  it  clear  that  their  movement  to  free  them- 
selves from  Great  Britain  was  not  to  be  interpreted  as  a 
desire  to  be  reunited  with  the  Ottoman  Empire. 

The  annexation  of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  although  a 
violation  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin,  was  not  vetoed  by  the 
great  powers.  They  accepted  the  fait  accompli.  The 
Turkish  government  received  only  non-committal  responses 
from  the  other  signatories  of  the  treaty.  Eussia,  the  most 
interested  power  and  the  traditional  champion  of  the  Bal- 
kan Slavs,  had  hardly  recovered  from  the  war  with  Japan 
and  internal  political  disturbances.  France  was  at  the 
moment  preparing  to  violate  another  international  agree- 
ment, the  convention  of  Algeciras.  Italy  was  making  her 
plans  for  doing  in  Tripoli  what  Austria-Hungary  had  done 
in  the  two  Balkan  provinces.  Great  Britain  was  afraid 
to  hale  Austria-Hungary  before  an  international  confer- 
ence for  fear  that  the  question  of  Egypt  might  make  pos- 
sible an  embarrassing  tu  qiwque.  Had  Russia  insisted 
upon  a  conference,  as  Germany  did  two  years  earlier  in 
the  case  of  Morocco,  Italy  and  Germany  (the  former  be- 
cause the  annexation  cut  off  the  Serbians  from  the  Adriatic 
and  the  latter  because  it  created  a  situation  advantageous 


222         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

to  her  Drang  nach  Osten)  could  not  have  been  relied 
upon  to  take  a  stand  against  their  partner  in  the  Triple 
Alliance. 

Turkey  found  herself  isolated,  no  power  being  willing 
to  support  her  demand  upon  Austria-Hungary  to  restore 
Bosnia  and  Herzegovina.  After  a  brief  period  of  wild 
agitation,  during  which  Austro-Hungarian  goods  and  ships 
were  boycotted  in  Turkey,^  the  Sublime  Porte  agreed  to 
take  a  cash  payment  for  the  two  provinces.  Serbia  was 
not  so  easily  appeased.  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina  not  only 
lay  between  her  and  the  sea,  but  were  inhabited  by  people 
of  Serbian  blood  and  language,  who  had  an  essential  place 
in  her  dream  of  Greater  Serbia.  The  annexation  of  Bosnia 
and  Herzegovina  fanned  the  fires  of  Serbian  nationalism, 
which  burned  harmlessly  for  several  years  until  the  Balkan 
wars  and  the  recovery  of  Russia  made  them  blaze  into  a 
European  conflagration.^ 

Like  the  annexation  of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  the  proc- 
lamation of  the  complete  independence  of  Bulgaria  had 
international  importance  beyond  merely  confirming  a  long 
established  de  facto  situation.  Bulgaria,  freed  of  all  tech- 
nical restraints  and  master  of  her  railways,  immediately 
developed  a  military  strength  that  alarmed  Rumania  and 
made  Serbia  and  Greece  feel  that  Bulgaria  had  become  a 
more  serious  and  formidable  rival  for  the  devolution  of 
Macedonia.  Independent  Bulgaria  gained  immeasurably 
in  prestige  in  the  eyes  of  Macedonians.  In  many  districts 
communities  that,  hitherto,  had  been  uncertain  whether  to 
pose  as  Bulgars  or  Serbs  now  saw  in  Bulgaria  their  hope 

*  Most  of  the  red  fezes  worn  by  Ottoman  subjects  were  of  Austrian  origin. 
In  their  first  anger  the  Turks  destroyed  these,  tearing  them  from  their  heads 
and  trampling  on  them  in  the  bazaars.  But  they  soon  found  that  they  could 
get  new  ones  only  by  buying  from  Vienna,  which  meant  that  the  boycott  cre- 
ated a  market  for  more  fezes,  to  the  profit  of  the  Austrian  manufacturers! 

'  The  Hapsburg  heir  was  assassinated  by  a  Serbian  student  during  an  offi- 
cial visit  to  the  capital  of  Bosnia.  The  assassin  belonged  to  a  secret  Serbian 
society,  the  Narodny  Obrana,  whose  propaganda  in  the  Serbian-speaking  prov- 
inces of  the  Hapsburg  empire  was  believed  by  Vienna  statesmen  to  threaten 
the  existence  of  Austria-Hungary. 


THE  YOUNG  TURK  REVOLUTION  (1908-1911)        223 

of  redemption  from  the  Ottoman  yoke.  In  1913,  and  again 
in  1915,  this  fact  profoundly  influenced  the  course  of  Euro- 
pean history. 

Long  before  the  Young  Turk  Revolution,  the  three  Medi- 
terranean naval  powers.  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy, 
together  with  Russia,  had  been  striving  by  diplomacy  and 
force  to  prevent  the  union  of  Crete  with  Greece.  In  their 
effort  to  maintain  the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire, 
the  great  powers  had  failed  to  stifle  the  aspirations  of  the 
Balkan  peoples.  But  because  Crete  was  an  island,  and  a 
few  war-vessels  could  do  the  trick,  Crete  was  the  victim  of 
the  desire  of  the  powers  to  demonstrate  to  Turkey  that 
they  were  her  friends.  After  the  revolution  of  1908  the 
four  ''protecting  powers"  did  not  change  their  inhibitory 
policy  towards  Crete.  The  decree  of  union  with  Greece  was 
vetoed,  and  when  the  Greek  flag  was  hoisted  by  the  Cretans 
under  the  leadership  of  Venizelos,  their  principal  insurgent 
leader,  the  four  powers  made  a  naval  demonstration  and 
landed  marines.^  Their  consuls  at  Candia  informed  the 
Cretans  that  their  governments  were  resolved  to  maintain 
the  rights  of  Turkey  and  to  prevent  Crete  from  joining 
Greece. 

The  persistence  of  the  powers  in  this  policy  convinced 
Venizelos  that  Crete  could  be  freed  only  by  making 
Greece  strong  enough  to  defy  Turkey,  in  cooperation  with 
the  other  Balkan  states.  All  these  states,  since  the  failure 
of  the  Miirzsteg  program,^  in  view  of  the  attitude  of  the 
powers  towards  Crete,  had  given  up  hope  of  substantial  aid 
from  any  of  the  powers  in  protecting  and  eventually  eman- 
cipating numbers  of  their  people  who  were  still  under 
Ottoman  rule.  When  we  consider  the  role  of  Venizelos  in 
the  wars  that  followed,  we  realize  the  importance  of  the 

^  This  had  been  done  before.  For  a  full  account  of  the  successive  Cretan 
revolutions  and  the  relations  of  the  protecting  powers  with  the  insurgents,  the 
Sublime  Porte,  and  Greece,  see  mj  "Venizelos"  (in  The  Modern  Statesmen 
series),  pp.  12-83. 

'See  pp.  110,  248-249. 


224  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Cretan  imbroglio  among  the  events  leading  up  to  the 
World  War. 

The  assumption  of  the  Young  Turks  that  a  constitutional 
regime  entailed  the  abolition  of  a  special  status  or  of  priv- 
ileges for  every  element  in  the  empire  resulted  in  the 
immediate  loss  of  Bosnia,  Herzegovina,  and  Bulgaria,  and 
hastened  the  severing  of  the  bonds  between  Constantinople 
and  Crete,  Cyprus,  Egj^pt,  and  Tripoli.  It  also  led  to  rebel- 
lion among  Albanians  and  some  of  the  Arabs,  and  disaffec- 
tion among  Greeks,  Armenians,  Syrians,  and  the  rest  of  the 
Arabs.  The  Young  Turk  movement  resulted  in  the  aliena- 
tion of  territories  to  mn  back  which  it  was  launched,  and 
it  led  to  hopeless  antagonism  instead  of  harmonious  coop- 
eration between  the  Turkish  and  non-Turkish  elements  of 
the  empire.  Albanians  and  Arabs,  although  largely  of  the 
same  rehgion  as  the  Turks,  were  not  assimilated  mth  their 
conquerors,  and  over  large  portions  of  Albania  and 
Arabia  the  sultans  had  never  been  able  to  secure  for  Con- 
stantinople the  recognition  of  any  other  than  religious 
authority. 

The  tribes  were  left  to  themselves,  and  the  Turks  msely 
refrained  from  collecting  taxes  or  insisting  upon  mihtary 
service,  and  did  not  extend  administrative  control  except 
in  large  cities  along  waterways  and  in  ports.  The  consti- 
tutional Young  Turks  attempted  to  do  what  the  autocratic 
Abdul  Hamid  had  never  dared  to  do.  They  called  upon 
Albanians  and  Arabs  to  pay  taxes  and  join  the  army,  and, 
when  they  refused  to  do  so,  sent  expeditions  to  put  do^\ai 
the  rebellions  they  themselves  had  provoked.  Between 
1909  and  1912  the  Ottoman  government  was  drained  finan- 
cially and  militarily  by  its  attempt  to  compel  the  Albanians 
and  Arabs  to  accept  the  full  responsibilities  of  Ottoman 
citizenship  under  a  constitutional  government. 

In  logically  following  the  same  policy,  the  Greeks,  Ar- 
menians, and  Syrians  were  asked  to  surrender  the  special 
status  granted  them  at  the  time  of  the  Ottoman  conquest. 


THE  YOUNG  TURK  REVOLUTION  (1908-1911)        225 

Omng  to  fundamental  differences  between  Mohammedan 
and  Christian  institutions,  the  Ottoman  sultans  of  the 
period  of  conquest  recognized  the  Christians  as  separate 
millets  (nations),  with  a  certain  degree  of  autonomy  under 
their  clergy.  Questions  of  inheritance,  property,  marriage 
and  divorce,  education,  and  legal  disputes  between  Chris- 
tians were  left  to  be  settled  among  themselves.  Upon  the 
pajTuent  of  a  head-tax  Christians  were  exempted  from  mili- 
tary service.  All  these  privileges  the  Young  Turks  deter- 
mined to  abolish,  and  expected  the  Christians  to  yield,  on 
the  sole  ground  that  constitutional  government  made  their 
continuance  unnecessary  and  impossible. 

Had  the  Young  Turks  been  willing  to  establish  a  genuine 
constitutional  government,  on  the  model  of  European 
states,  they  would  have  been  justified  in  asking  for  the  sur- 
render of  both  de  facto  and  de  jure  privileges  or  excep- 
tional situations.  But  their  idea  of  constitutional  govern- 
ment was  modified  by  the  assumption  that  the  new  political 
institutions  did  not  necessitate  the  surrender  either  of  the 
Shari'a  (Mohanmiedan  jurisprudence)  or  of  Turkish 
hegemony  in  the  empire.  Mohammedan  law  made  no  pro- 
vision for  non-Moslems,  and  long  experience  had  taught 
that  while  the  Shari'a  was  enforced  no  code  of  civil  law 
could  be  devised  that  would  provide  for  the  needs  of 
Christians  and  at  the  same  time  guarantee  them  equal 
justice. 

The  elections  to  the  first  parliament,  repeated  in  the  sec- 
ond and  third  parliaments,  demonstrated  that  the  Turks 
were  determined  to  have  a  majority,  irrespective  of  the 
numbers  and  geographical  distribution  of  other  peoples  in 
the  empire,  whether  Moslem  or  Christian.  The  political 
history  of  Europe  shows  that  by  restrictions  in  the  electo- 
rate and  by  skilful  gerrymandering  it  is  possible  for  a 
dominant  class  or  racial  element  to  maintain  itself.  But 
this  element  must  be  superior  in  virility,  wealth,  intelli- 
gence, and  background  of  capabilities,  if  not  in  number,  to 


226         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  other  elements.  The  Turks  had  been  predominant  in 
their  heterogeneous  empire  up  to  the  nineteenth  century  by 
force  and  during  the  nineteenth  century  by  the  aid  of 
European  powers.  Albanians,  Arabs,  Syrians,  Greeks,  and 
Armenians  outnumbered  the  Turks,  and,  if  fair  elections 
had  been  held,  would  have  been  able  to  control  the  parha- 
ment.  This  danger  was  immediately  sensed  by  the  Young 
Turks,  who  used  their  hold  on  the  central  government  at 
Constantinople  and  on  the  army  to  build  up  a  despotism 
worse  than  that  of  Abdul  Hamid. 

From  1908  to  1911  Turkey  was  ruled  by  a  secret  organ- 
ization, called  the  Committee  of  Union  and  Progress,  which 
contained  only  a  handful  of  non-Turks.  This  committee 
ran  the  parliamentary  elections  and  dictated  every  policy 
of  successive  cabinets.  By  a  fanatical  effort  to  make  Turk- 
ish the  language  of  the  administration  of  local  government 
and  courts  throughout  the  empire,  and  by  asserting  the 
right  of  Turkish  nationalism  to  be  regarded  as  synonymous 
with  Ottoman  nationality,  the  Young  Turks  aroused  a 
counter-nationalism  among  Albanians,  Arabs,  Syrians, 
Greeks,  and  Armenians. 

These  movements  in  turn  forced  the  Near  Eastern  ques- 
tion once  more  to  the  front  among  international  problems. 
The  massacre  of  thirty  thousand  Armenians  in  Cilicia  and 
northern  Syria  in  the  spring  of  1909  caused  a  revival  of 
the  demand  of  the  humanitarians,  especially  in  England, 
that  the  powers  fulfil  their  obligation  under  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  and  compel  the  Turks  to  institute  serious  adminis- 
trative reforms  in  the  vilayets  (provinces)  inhabited  by 
Armenians.  Russia  began  to  dream  once  more  of  Con- 
stantinople. Germany  was  able  to  increase  her  economic 
hold  on  Turkey  by  representing  herself  as  the  disinterested 
defender  of  Islam  against  the  rapacity  of  the  other  Euro- 
pean powers.  Italy  saw  that  she  would  have  to  act  quickly 
in  TripoH  or  lose  her  hope  of  annexing  that  province.  Al- 
banian nationalism,  which  had  never  before  manifested 


?H^  YOUNG  TURK  REVOLUTION  (1908-1911)        227 

itself  as  a  unifjdng  force,  began  to  worry  the  Adriatic 
powers,  Italy  and  Austria-Hungary,  and  Albania's  cov- 
etous neighbors,  Greece  and  Serbia.  Most  important  of 
all,  the  danger  to  Hellenism  throughout  the  Ottoman  Em- 
pire, and  to  all  the  Christian  peoples  in  European  Turkey, 
drove  into  one  another's  arms,  for  common  action  against 
Turkey,  the  Balkan  peoples,  whose  animosities  and  rival- 
ries Abdul  Hamid  had  known  so  well  how  to  exploit. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

ITALIAN  EXPANSION  IN  AFRICA    (1882-1911) 

ITALY,  like  Germany,  did  not  achieve  her  political  unity 
until  the  new  impulsion  given  to  the  overseas  expansion 
of  Europe  by  the  development  of  steam  power  in  industry 
and  transportation  was  half  a  century  old.  The  most 
promising  fields  for  colonization  had  been  preempted.  The 
titles  to  the  most  conveniently  and  strategically  placed 
ports  in  Africa  and  Asia  were  already  acquired  by  other 
powers,  especially  Great  Britain.  This  was  true  even  in 
the  Mediterranean.  Great  Britain  was  not  at  all,  and 
France  only  partly,  a  Mediterranean  country,  while  Italy 
was  wholly  a  Mediterranean  country.  And  yet,  when  the 
Italians  began  to  think  of  Italy  as  a  world  power,  they  had 
to  face  and  make  the  best  of  a  situation  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean that  was  disadvantageous  to  their  unhampered 
political  and  economic  development.  France  held  Corsica 
and  Great  Britain  Malta.  The  British  controlled  the 
passage  from  the  Mediterranean  to  the  Atlantic.  Pos- 
session of  Algeria  gave  France  a  great  start  in  African 
colonization. 

As  if  this  were  not  enough,  the  efforts  of  Italian  states- 
men to  find  a  place  for  Italy  in  Africa  were  met  by  a  further 
drastic  increase  of  the  hold  of  Great  Britain  and  France 
upon  the  Mediterranean.  In  1878  the  British  occupied 
Cyprus,  and  in  1882  they  entered  Eg\^t  and  became  mas- 
ters of  Italy 's  only  other  outlet  to  the  world.  The  greatest 
blow  to  Italy's  colonial  ambitions,  however,  was  the  signa- 
ture of  the  treaty  of  Bardo,  on  May  12,  1881,  by  which  the 
bey  of  Tunisia  accepted  the  protectorate  of  France.  Only 
twenty-four  hours  earlier  the  French  minister  of  foreign 

228 


ITALIAN  EXPANSION  IN  AFRICA  (1882-1911)        229 

affairs,  at  the  instance  of  Premier  Ferry,  had  assured  the 
Italian  ambassador  in  Paris  that  France  "had  no  thought 
of  occupying  Tunisia,  or  any  part  of  Tunisian  territory, 
beyond  some  points  of  the  Kroumir  country."  Indigna- 
tion and  disappointment  drove  Italy  into  the  arms  of  Ger- 
many and  Austria-Hungary.  Shortly  after  the  French 
occupied  Tunisia,  she  became  a  member  of  the  Triple 
Alliance,  to  which  she  remained  faithful  until  after  the 
outbreak  of  the  World  War. 

The  extension  of  French  political  control  over  Tunisia 
has  always  rankled  in  the  minds  of  the  Italians,  and  the 
resentment  is  still  keen  forty  years  after  the  event.  A  few 
months  before  the  French  invasion,  the  Italian  government 
had  purchased  from  an  English  company,  at  eight  times  its 
value,  the  only  railway  in  Tunisia.  Large  numbers  of 
Italians  were  settled  there,  while  France  could  lay  claim  to 
very  few  nationals.^  Tunisia  was  the  most  promising  and 
most  logical  colonizing  possibility  that  Italy  ever  cherished. 
Moreover,  its  proximity  to  Sicily,  at  the  narrowest  part  of 
the  Mediterranean,  made  its  possession  appear  to  be  of 
great  importance  for  the  security  of  Italy.  Italian  writers 
denounced  the  conversion  of  Bizerta  into  a  naval  base  by 
the  French  as  a  menace. 

The  first  foothold  in  Africa  was  secured  on  the  Eed  Sea 
coast  at  a  time  when  Egypt  was  just  becoming  the  center 
of  acute  international  rivalry.  The  port  of  Assab  was 
occupied  in  1880,  to  make  effective  a  title  granted  by  the 
local  sovereign  to  an  Italian  merchant  ten  years  earlier. 
The  British  and  the  French,  who  were  at  loggerheads  in 
Egypt,  resented  this  intrusion,  and  made  Italy  promise  not 
to  fortify  Assab  or  even  keep  a  garrison  there.  When  the 
affairs  of  Egypt  reached  a  crisis  in  the  early  summer  of 

^Even  after  forty  years  of  French  occupation  the  Italians  are  by  far  the 
largest  foreign  element.  Exact  figures  can  not  be  given,  for  the  French 
authorities  make  a  distinction  between  Italians  and  "Anglo-Maltese,"  while 
among  the  French  are  included  a  large  number  of  native  Jews.  From  the 
official  census,  however,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  in  1922  there  are  more  than  three 
Italians  to  every  Frenchman  in  Tunisia. 


230         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

1882,  Assab  was  proclaimed  an  Italian  crown  colony.  Italy, 
like  France,  was  invited  by  Great  Britain  to  take  part  in 
the  armed  intervention  in  Egypt.  She  refused,  and,  when 
the  British  acted  alone,  Italian  diplomacy  asserted  itself 
at  Cairo  to  encourage  resistance  to  Great  Britain's  stay- 
ing on  indefinitely  and  consolidating  the  hold  her  army 
gave  her  upon  Egj'^t  and  the  canal. 

When  the  British  decided  to  abandon  the  Sudan,  they 
encouraged  the  Italians  to  extend  their  zone  of  occupation 
northward  along  the  Red  Sea  to  Massawa,  which  was  seized 
by  an  Italian  expeditionary  force  in  February,  1885.  Only 
the  fall  of  the  Gladstone  government  prevented  the  further 
extension  of  the  Italian  occupation  to  Suakim.  Salisbury 
reversed  the  decision  to  withdraw  the  Anglo-Egyptian 
troops  from  this  port.  But  there  was  no  opposition  to  the 
Massawa  adventure,  because  it  was  natural  for  the  British 
to  prefer  weak  and  inexperienced  Italy  to  Russia  or  France 
in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Sudan.  It  was  common  knowl- 
edge that  both  Paris  and  Petrograd  planned  to  use  Mas- 
sawa as  a  base  for  intrigues  in  the  Sudan  by  which  to 
embarrass  the  British  and  that  they  would  attempt  to  estab- 
lish a  protectorate  over  Abyssinia. 

For  several  years  the  Italians  had  a  free  hand  in  their 
dealings  with  Abyssinia.  Intervening  in  dynastic  wars, 
they  successfully  backed  Menelek  against  another  claimant. 
In  return  for  recognition  as  emperor,  Menelek  agreed,  in 
September,  1889,  to  a  treaty  by  which  frontier  territories 
were  ceded  to  the  Assab  colony  and  the  foreign  relations 
of  Abyssinia  were  put  in  the  hands  of  the  Italian  govern- 
ment. Italy  notified  the  powers  that  Abyssinia  was  an 
Italian  protectorate.  The  British  government  discounted 
the  ability  of  the  Italians  to  exercise  influence  in  Abyssinia, 
and  willingly  admitted  the  Italian  contention  that  Abys- 
sinia was  within  the  Italian  sphere  of  influence,  in  return 
for  Italy's  promise  not  to  penetrate  the   Sudan  but  to 


ITALIAN  EXPANSION  IN  AFRICA  (1882-1911)        231 

recognize  British  rights  in  the  upper  Nile.  The  Italian 
Red  Sea  coast  territories  were  consolidated  into  the  crown 
colony  of  Eritrea. 

To  the  east  and  south  of  Abyssinia,  the  triangle  between 
the  Gulf  of  Aden  and  the  Indian  Ocean  is  inhabited  by 
Arab  tribes,  which  have  largely  succeeded,  as  have  similar 
tribes  of  the  Arabian  peninsula  opposite,  in  holding  their 
own  against  all  European  comers.  In  the  Gulf  of  Aden, 
France  and  Great  Britain  held  parts  of  Somaliland.  The 
French  colony  of  Djibouti  prevented  the  extension  of 
Eritrea  southward  to  the  entrance  of  the  Eed  Sea.  Beyond 
Djibouti,  to  the  east,  lay  British  Somaliland.  But  the 
Italians  were  allowed  to  occupy  the  long  strip  of  land  on 
the  Indian  Ocean  from  Cape  Guardafui  south  to  the  river 
Juba,  which  formed  the  northern  boundary  of  British  East 
Africa.  The  crown  colony  of  Benadir  was  established,  and 
gradually  treaties  with  Somali  sultans  brought  Italy  to  the 
frontier  of  Abyssinia  on  the  southeast  as  well  as  on  the 
north. 

Alarmed  by  Italian  demands,  constantly  reiterated,  for 
boundaries  that  would  rob  Abyssinia  of  valuable  territory, 
and  by  the  pretension  of  Italy  to  stand  between  Menelek 
and  relations  with  the  other  powers,  the  emperor  refused 
to  recognize  the  Italian  protectorate.  After  a  long  period 
of  fruitless  negotiations,  the  Italians  decided  to  use  force. 
They  invaded  Abyssinia,  and  were  defeated  by  Emperor 
Menelek  in  a  decisive  battle  before  they  had  penetrated 
very  far  toward  the  capital,  which  they  believed  they  were 
going  to  reach  without  great  effort.  The  costly  battle  of 
Adowa  caused  a  revulsion  of  feeling  in  Italy  against  colo- 
nial ventures.  March  1,  1896,  marked  the  destruction  of 
the  prestige  of  Italy  in  Africa,  and  it  has  never  been  re- 
stored. The  backward  peoples  of  Africa  accept  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact  the  superiority  of  Great  Britain  and  France. 
But,  because  they  do  not  consider  that  the  Italians  fight 


232         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

better  than  themselves  or  are  able  to  make  use  of  greater 
resources,  Italy  is  not,  in  their  eyes,  on  the  same  footing 
as  the  other  leading  European  powers. 

By  the  treaty  of  Adis  Ababa,  October  26,  1896,  Italy  was 
compelled  to  renounce  her  claim  to  a  protectorate  and  her 
right  to  delimit  boundaries  according  to  her  own  pleasure. 
As  an  added  humiliation,  she  agreed  to  pay  an  indemnity 
of  two  million  dollars  in  exchange  for  the  release  of  the 
large  number  of  prisoners  that  had  been  taken  by  the 
Abyssinian  army.  But  in  1900  Menelek,  who  was  never 
unreasonable  in  his  dealings  with  the  powers,  tacitly  al- 
lowed Italy  to  occupy  a  part  of  the  high  plateau,  which  had 
been  one  of  the  causes  of  the  dispute;  for  without  this 
rectification  of  frontier  Eritrea  could  not  have  been  devel- 
oped into  a  colony  that  would  be  of  any  value  to  a  Euro- 
pean power. 

The  desire  to  extend  into  every  sphere  of  colonial  activity 
the  spirit  of  their  agreement  of  1904,  and  to  secure  the  tacit 
acceptance  of  the  other  powers  to  articles  of  the  agreement 
where  they  might  possibly  be  able  to  upset  the  compromise 
or  complicate  its  execution,  led  Great  Britain  and  France 
to  negotiate  a  number  of  supplementary  agreements. 
Among  these  was  the  Abyssinian  convention  of  December 
13,  1906,  to  which  Italy  adhered.  The  independence  and 
territorial  integrity  of  Abyssinia  were  guaranteed  by  the 
three  powers,  who  promised  mutually  to  respect  the  sov- 
ereign rights  of  the  emperor.  No  concessions  were  to  be 
granted  to  one  power  prejudicial  to  the  interests  of  the 
other  two. 

No  matter  what  internal  complications  might  arise  in 
Abyssinia,  intervention  was  forbidden  unless  the  three 
powers  agreed  to  cooperate  in  sending  troops  and  was 
to  be  limited  to  the  protection  of  the  legations  and  the 

*To  have  a  clear  idea  of  how  Abyssinia  is  landlocked  by  French  Djibouti, 
British  and  Italian  Somaliland,  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan,  and  Italian  Eritrea, 
reference  must  be  made  to  the  map. 


ITALIAN  EXPANSION  IN  AFRICA  (1882-1911)         233 

lives  and  property  of  foreigners.  The  railway  line  from 
Djibouti  ^  to  Adis  Ababa  was  to  be  owned  by  a  French 
company,  but  equal  privileges  over  the  line  and  at  the  port 
were  promised  to  the  subjects  of  the  other  two  powers. 
The  railways  that  might  be  built  west  of  Adis  Ababa  were 
to  be  constructed  by  Great  Britain,  and  the  line  from  north 
to  south  connecting  the  two  Italian  colonies  by  Italy.  Great 
Britain  was  to  be  allowed  a  railway  through  Abyssinia 
from  her  Somaliland  protectorate  to  the  Sudan.  Any  of 
the  contracting  powers  could  veto  any  agreement  made  by 
one  of  the  others  with  Abyssinia,  should  the  power  judge 
the  agreement  harmful  to  her  interests. 

This  convention,  like  many  others  that  have  been  signed 
by  particular  European  states  concerning  African  and 
Asiatic  political  and  economic  matters,  has  neither  national 
nor  international  sanction.  Turkey,  Persia,  Morocco, 
Egypt,  China,  and  Siam  have  had  the  same  experiences  as 
Abyssinia.  Their  present  and  their  future  have  been  ten- 
tatively disposed  of  mthout  consideration  for  either  their 
mshes  or  their  interests.  Nor  have  such  conventions,  as 
a  general  rule,  been  submitted  for  discussion  and  approval 
to  the  parliaments  of  the  nations  that  have  made  them. 
The  countries  concerning  which  they  have  been  made  are 
the  victims  of  their  negative  character;  for  the  dog-in-the- 
manger  attitude  of  the  signatory  powers  prevents  normal 
economic  development.  The  worst  feature  of  these  con- 
ventions is  the  injury  they  do  to  nations  that  were  not  a 
party  to  them,  and  were  not  consulted  in  their  making,  nor 
sometimes  even  informed  of  their  existence.  Suddenly 
these  outside  nations  have  found  themselves  confronted 
with  a  de  facto  situation,  with  no  legal  or  moral  sanction, 
established  contrary  to  their  interests. 

The  revenues  of  Eritrea  have  never  equaled  the  expendi- 
tures for  civil  administration.  Italy  has  had  to  make  good 
a  substantial  annual  deficit,  and  pay  the  charges  of  a  con- 
siderable military  force  besides.     Giving  to  the  intracta- 


234         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

bility  of  the  native  sultans  and  the  success  of  the  Mullah 
Mohammed  in  defying  the  British  in  the  neighboring 
colony,  the  Italian  Somaliland  protectorate  has  meant  only 
trouble.  But  the  Benadir  colony  in  the  south,  organized 
and  developed  on  sound  lines  since  1908,  is  a  good  market 
for  cotton  cloth  and  other  manufactured  products,  and  the 
Italians  get  commission  and  transportation  profits  out  of 
a  growing  export  cattle  trade. 

After  the  bitter  disappointment  on  the  confines  of  Abys- 
sinia, Italy  began  to  concentrate  her  energies  on  Tripoli, 
the  last  Ottoman  possession  in  Africa,  which  Italian  states- 
men had  always  looked  upon  as  an  eventual  compensation 
for  the  loss  of  Tunisia.  When  the  Anglo-French  agree- 
ment of  1899,  delimiting  spheres  of  influence  in  the  Sudan, 
gave  the  whole  of  the  Sahara  to  France,  including  the  oases 
of  the  desert  hinterland  of  Tripoli,  Turkey  and  Italy  were 
greatly  agitated.  The  possessor  and  the  self-appointed 
heir  both  felt  that  this  agreement  disregarded  their  rights, 
and  that  Great  Britain  had  compensated  France  for  deny- 
ing her  access  to  the  Nile  Basin  (this  was  just  after  the 
Fashoda  incident)  at  their  expense. 

Nowhere  is  the  duplicity  of  European  diplomacy  more 
strikingly  revealed  than  in  the  negotiations  of  Italy  with 
France  and  Great  Britain  concerning  Africa  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  twentieth  century.  The  French  and  British 
ambassadors  at  Constantinople  assured  the  Sublime  Porte 
of  their  affection  and  loyalty,  and  the  British  and  French 
governments  assured  the  Turkish  ministers  at  London 
and  Paris  of  their  determination  to  uphold  the  doctrine  of 
the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  But  at  the  time  these 
professions  of  loyalty  and  friendship  were  made  they  were 
placating  and  bribing  Italy.  Secret  agreements  were  made 
with  France  in  1901  and  Great  Britain  in  1902  in  which  the 
reversion  of  Tripoli  was  promised  to  Italy  in  return  for 
her  acceptance  of  the  bases  on  which  the  British  and  French 
were  negotiating  a  settlement  of  their  rivalries,  L  e.,  British 


ITALIAN  EXPANSION  IN  AFRICA  (1882-1911)        235 

possession  of  Egypt  and  French  possession  of  Morocco. 
Italy  also  agreed  to  cooperate  with  the  other  two  powers 
in  drafting  an  Abyssinian  convention.  A  policy  of  ''pacific 
penetration"  was  begun  by  the  Italians  in  Tripoli,  which 
might  have  been  successful  in  detaching  the  last  African 
province  from  the  Ottoman  Empire  but  for  the  Young  Turk 
Revolution  of  1908. 


CHAPTER  XX 

THE  EEOPENING  OF  THE  NEAE  EASTERN  QUESTION 
BY  ITALY   (1911-1912) 

LONG  before  any  tangible  step  had  been  taken  towards 
the  unification  of  Italy,  Mazzini  in  exile  said,  "North 
Africa  will  belong  to  Italy."  The  dream  of  a  new  Punic 
conquest  was  not  realized.  While  Italy  was  still  too  weak 
to  attempt  to  thwart  their  plans,  Great  Britain  and  France 
occupied  Egypt  and  Tunisia,  penetrated  the  Sudan  and  the 
Sahara,  and,  deciding  to  compromise  rather  than  fight,  di- 
vided north  Africa  from  Morocco  to  Lake  Chad  and  the 
head-waters  of  the  Nile.  All  that  was  left  outside  the 
Anglo-French  spheres  of  influence  were  Abyssinia,  with 
strips  of  adjacent  Red  Sea  and  Somaliland  coast,  and  the 
Turkish  province  of  Tripoli.^  Italy  was  allowed  two  Afri- 
can colonies,  on  the  Red  Sea  and  in  Somahland,  but,  after 
one  attempt  had  ignominiously  failed,  was  forced  to  agree 
with  Great  Britain  and  France  to  abstain  from  seeking 
again  to  seize  Abyssinia. 

Under  the  Franco-Italian  agreement  of  1901  it  was  un- 
derstood that  if  France  should  ever  extend  her  protectorate 
over  Morocco,  Italy  would  have  what  was  left  of  the  Otto- 
man dominions  in  Africa,  excluding,  of  course,  Egypt. 
Italy,  on  her  side,  recognized  the  validity  of  the  Anglo- 
French  partition  of  the  Sudan,  and  promised  not  to  take 
the  Turkish  view  of  the  extent  of  the  hinterland  of  Tripoli.^ 

*  The  district  of  Benghazi  (Barca),  between  Tripoli  and  Egypt,  was  placed 
under  separate  administration,  depending  directly  upon  the  Sublime  Porte, 
in  1875,  forty  years  after  Tripoli  was  proclaimed  a  vilayet  (province)  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire.  Although  Benghazi  had  nearly  as  many  inhabitants  aa 
Tripoli  proper,  it  was  still,  at  the  time  of  the  Italian  conquest,  commonly 
spoken  of  as  a  part  of  Tripoli. 

"  As  early  as  1892  France  and  Turkey  had  arrived  at  an  understanding  con- 
cerning the  boundary  line  between   Tripoli  and   Tunisia,  from  the  Mediter- 

236 


ITALY  REOPENS  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION       237 

The  "right"  of  Italy  to  Tripoli  was  recognized  by  Great 
Britain,  with  reservations  as  to  the  eastern  frontier  of  the 
eventual  colony,  later  by  the  international  conference  of 
Algeciras  in  1906.  These  diplomatic  understandings  meant 
simply  that  the  other  powers  would  not  seek  concessions 
or  special  privileges  in  Tripoli  and  that  they  would  not 
oppose  a  transfer  of  the  vilayet  from  Turkey  to  Italy. 
There  was  no  promise  of  support  for  any  demand  Rome 
might  make  upon  Constantinople. 

The  economic  conquest  of  Tripoli  was  cleverly  conceived 
and  was  faithfully  tried  out.  Branches  of  the  Banca  di 
Eoma  were  established  at  Tripoli  and  Benghazi,  and,  for 
the  first  time  since  the  days  of  imperial  Rome,  a  serious 
attempt  was  made  to  develop  the  agricultural  and  commer- 
cial resources  of  the  country.  The  natives  were  encour- 
aged in  every  enterprise,  and  they  became — in  the  vicinity 
of  seaports  and  trading-posts,  at  least — dependent  for  their 
livelihood  on  the  Banca  di  Roma.  Heavily  subsidized 
Italian  steamship  lines  maintained  regular  and  frequent 
services  between  Tripoli,  Benghazi,  and  Derna,  and  Tunis 
and  Alexandria.  The  admirable  ItaUan  parcels  post  sys- 
tem (one  of  the  most  successful  in  Europe)  extended  its 
operations  into  the  hinterland  and  captured  the  ostrich- 
feather  trade.  The  Italians  began  to  talk  of  making  secure 
the  routes  to  Ghadames,  Ghat,  and  Murzuk,  and  of  estab- 
lishing in  the  interior  postal  and  banking  facilities  that 
these  regions  could  never  hope  to  have  under  Turkish  ad- 
ministration. It  was  planned  to  begin  railway  construc- 
tion as  soon  as  Italian  capital  was  available. 

The  Constantinople  revolution  of  July,  1908,  changed  the 
situation.     The  indolent  and  corrupt  officials  of  Tripoli 

ranean  to  the  oasis  of  Ghadames,  but  they  had  never  agreed  upon  the  southern 
boundary  of  Tripoli.  Turkey  was  not  a  party  to  the  Anglo-French  agreement 
of  1899.  Because  of  the  importance  of  keeping  open  a  path  to  central 
Africa  through  the  Senussi  tribes  for  the  furthering  of  his  pan-Islamic  propa- 
ganda, Abdul  Hamid  had  refused  to  accept  the  French  idea  of  a  sphere  of 
influence,  and  Turkish  troops  were  disputing  the  extension  of  French  military 
occupation  up  to  the  time  of  the  Italian  invasion  of  the  pro%'ince. 


238         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  Benghazi,  whose  attention  had  been  turned  from 
Italian  activities  by  Italian  gold  pieces,  were  replaced  by 
members  of  the  Union  and  Progress  party.^  The  new  offi- 
cials may  have  been  no  better  than  the  old  ones ;  for  execu- 
tive ability  is  not  inherent  in  the  Turkish  character.  But 
they  were  men  who  had  passed  through  the  fire  of  persecu- 
tion and  suffering  for  love  of  their  fatherland,  and  its 
renascence  was  the  supreme  thing  in  their  lives.  Their 
ambition  and  enthusiasm  knew  no  bounds. 

One  can  imagine  the  feelings  of  the  Young  Turks  when 
they  saw  what  Italy  was  doing.  It  is  easy  enough  to  say 
that  they  should  have  immediately  reformed  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  country  and  have  given  the  Tripolitans  an  ef- 
ficient government.  But  reform  does  not  come  in  a  twelve- 
month, and  the  Young  Turks  had  to  act  quickly  to  prevent 
the  loss  of  Tripoli.  They  took  the  only  means  they  had. 
Italian  enterprises  began  to  be  obstructed,  troops  were  sent 
to  extend  the  mihtary  frontiers  into  the  Sudan,  and  the 
fanatical  Moslem  tribes  of  the  interior  were  brought  into 
closer  touch  with  the  Ottoman  khalifate. 

Italy  saw  her  hopes  being  destroyed  as  her  colonial  plans 
had  been  destroyed  in  the  previous  decade.  Representa- 
tions at  Constantinople  were  without  effect.  It  was  a  fruit- 
less diplomatic  task  to  persuade  Young  Turkey  that  Otto- 
man officials  in  Tripoh  and  Benghazi  should  be  forbidden 
to  hinder  the  onward  march  of  Italian  ''peaceable  con- 
quest." The  economic  fabric  in  Tripoli,  so  carefully  and 
patiently  constructed,  seemed  to  have  been  for  nothing. 
By  the  annexation  of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina  in  1908 
Austria-Hungary  had  taken  a  fresh  step,  after  thirty  years, 
in  the  disintegration  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.^    No  power 

^  See  p.  226. 

'  The  earlier  steps,  after  the  formation  of  the  concert  of  European  powers, 
had  been  the  creation  of  Greece  by  the  protocol  of  1830;  the  cessions  of  terri- 
tory to  Russia  in  1829  and  1878;  the  independence  or  autonomy  of  the  Balkan 
peoples  recognized  in  the  treaty  of  Paris,  1856,  and  the  treaty  of  Berlin,  1878, 
and  special  conventions  arising  from  these  treaties;  the  alienation  of  Cyprua 
in  1878,  and  the  occupation  of  Egypt  in  1882  by  Great  Britain. 


ITALY  REOPENS  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION       239 

had  successfully  protested,  and  the  Turks  had  not  been 
able  to  make  reprisals.  By  not  seizing  Tripoli  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1908  Italy  let  pass  a  golden  opportunity  of  commit- 
ting her  contemplated  highway  robbery  without  resistance 
on  the  part  of  her  victim.  But  the  crisis  could  not  be  pre- 
cipitated. Pubhc  opinion,  wary  of  colonial  enterprises 
since  the  terrible  Abyssinian  disaster,  and  opposed  to  the 
imposition  of  fresh  taxes,  had  to  be  carefully  prepared  to 
sustain  the  government  in  a  hostile  action  against  Turkey. 

In  January,  1911,  the  Italian  press  began  to  publish  ar- 
ticles on  Tripoli,  dilatirg  upon  its  economic  value  and  vital 
importance  to  Italy  if  she  were  to  hold  her  place  among  the 
great  powers  and  maintain  the  balance  of  power  in  the 
Mediterranean.  Every  little  Turkish  persecution — and 
there  were  many  of  them — was  made  the  subject  of  a  front- 
page news  item.  The  Italian  people  were  worked  up  to 
believe  that  not  only  in  Tripoli  but  elsewhere  the  Young 
Turks  were  showing  contempt  for  Italian  officials  and  for 
the  Italian  flag.  A  sailing-vessel  was  seized  at  Hodeida  in 
the  Red  Sea;  the  incident  was  magnified.  An  American 
archaeological  expedition  was  granted  a  permit  to  dig  in 
Tripoli ;  a  similar  permit  had  been  refused  to  Italian  appli- 
cants, and  the  newspapers  pretended  that  the  Americans 
were  really  prospecting  for  silver-mines,  whose  develop- 
ment would  mean  disaster  to  the  great  mines  in  Sicily. 
French  troops  reached  the  oasis  of  Ghadames;  the  hinter- 
land of  Tripoli  was  threatened  by  the  extension  of  French 
administrative  control  into  the  eastern  Sahara.  At  this 
moment  the  reopening  of  the  Morocco  question  by  the 
Agadir  incident  gave  Italy  the  incentive  and  encourage- 
ment to  show  her  hand. 

In  September  the  press  campaign  against  the  treatment 
of  Italians  in  Tripoli  became  incessant  and  violent.  On 
September  27  the  first  of  the  series  of  ultimatums  that 
brought  all  Europe  into  war  was  delivered  to  the  Sublime 
Porte.    Italy  gave  Turkey  forty-eight  hours  to  consent  to 


240         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  occupation  of  Tripoli,  promising  on  her  side  to  main- 
tain the  sultan's  sovereignty  under  the  Italian  protector- 
ate and  to  pay  into  the  Ottoman  treasury  an  annual  subsidy. 
Two  classes  were  called  out,  General  Caneva  embarked 
his  troops  upon  transports  that  had  already  been  prepared, 
and  the  Italian  fleet  proceeded  to  Tripoli. 

Simultaneously  with  news  of  the  declaration  of  war  Con- 
stantinople learned  that  the  first  shots  had  already  been 
fired.  On  September  29,  without  notification  of  hostilities 
or  other  warning,  the  Italian  fleet  attacked  and  sank  Turk- 
ish torpedo-boats  off  Preveza  at  the  mouth  of  the  Adriatic. 
The  next  day  Italian  war-ships  opened  fire  upon  Tripoli. 
The  forts  were  dismantled  and  the  garrison  driven  out  of 
the  city.  On  October  5  Tripoli  surrendered.  The  expedi- 
tionary corps  disembarked  on  the  11th.  Troops  landed 
at  Derna  on  the  18th.  The  next  day  Benghazi  was  captured 
at  the  point  of  the  bayonet,  and  on  the  21st  Homs  was 
occupied. 

The  Turks  and  Arabs  attempted  to  retake  Tripoli  on  the 
23d.  While  the  Italian  soldiers  were  in  the  trenches  they 
were  fired  upon  from  behind  by  Arabs,  who  were  supposed 
to  be  non-combatants.  The  Italians  put  down  this  move 
from  the  rear  with  ruthless  severity,  shooting  and  cutting 
down  men,  women,  and  children.  Horror  was  excited 
throughout  the  world  by  the  stories  of  this  repression.  De- 
tails of  Italian  cruelty  were  emphasized,  and  little  mention 
was  made  of  the  provocation  that  had  led  to  the  massacre. 
The  French  and  English  newspaper  campaign  against 
Italy  was  as  violent  as  it  had  been  against  Austria  in  1908. 
The  act  of  piracy  of  which  Italy  had  been  guilty  was  de- 
nounced, and  no  terms  were  spared  in  casting  opprobrium 
upon  the  Italian  army.  The  indignation  of  newspaper 
correspondents  was  undoubtedly  sincere.  But  there  was 
also  the  interested  motive:  the  British  and  French  press 
featured  these  stories  to  embarrass  and  discredit  imitators 
in  empire-building  and  colonial  rivals.    Italy  had  experi- 


ITALY  REOPENS  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION       241 

enced  this  kind  of  thing  before,  at  the  time  of  her  tragic 
Abyssinian  adventure.  Belgium  was  experiencing  it  in 
central  Africa. 

Despite  the  conspiracy  behind  the  lines,  the  attempt  of 
the  Turks  and  Arabs  to  retake  Tripoli  failed,  and  a  second 
attack  on  October  26  proved  equally  unsuccessful.  On  the 
other  hand,  when  the  Italian  army  started  to  take  the  of- 
fensive on  November  6,  progress  beyond  the  suburbs  of 
Tripoli  was  found  to  be  impossible.  Without  roads  and 
railways  the  Italians  could  not  make  use  of  their  artillery 
and  their  superior  numbers.  They  were  safe  only  as  far  as 
the  guns  of  the  war-ships  protected  them.  This  was  true 
of  each  landing  force.  The  inhabitants  of  Tripoli  and  Ben- 
ghazi, and  not  the  small  and  poorly  equipped  Turkish 
forces,  successfully  resisted  the  Italians,  and  let  Italy  in 
for  a  long  and  costly  guerrilla  war  which  has  now  entered 
its  second  decade. 

On  November  5,  1911,  the  Italian  parliament  voted  the 
annexation  of  Tripoli  and  Benghazi.  None  of  the  powers 
refused  to  accept  the  fait  accompli  or  even  to  protest 
against  it.  France  and  Great  Britain  proclaimed  the  neu- 
trality of  Tunisia  and  Egypt,  but  were  lax  in  its  enforce- 
ment ;  from  both  sides  of  the  frontier  volunteers  and  ammu- 
nition poured  into  Tripoli.  Great  Britain  took  advantage 
of  the  situation  to  extend  the  Egyptian  boundary  west- 
ward. Italy  did  not  dare  to  contest  the  claims  advanced 
for  Egypt  by  Great  Britain,  knowing  well  that  Anglo- 
Egyptian  officials  had  it  in  their  power  to  wreck  Italian 
aspirations  simply  by  closing  their  eyes  to  gun-running 
from  the  Red  Sea  to  the  Tripolitan  hinterland. 

The  Turks,  not  having  control  of  the  sea  and  being 
barred  from  sending  an  army  across  Egypt,  were  incapable 
of  making  a  military  move  to  recover  the  invaded  provinces 
or  to  punish  the  invader.  Their  effort  was  limited  to 
stirring  up  and  organizing  the  Arabs.  General  Caneva 
went  to  Rome  at  the  beginning  of  February,  1912,  and  told 


242         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  cabinet  that  unless  the  Turks  consented  to  withdraw 
their  military  leaders  and  to  cease  their  religious  agitation 
it  would  take  months  to  get  a  start  in  Africa  (three  months 
had  already  passed)  and  years  to  complete  the  pacification 
of  the  new  colonies.  The  question  was,  how  could  Turkey 
be  forced  to  recognize  the  annexation  decree?  There  was 
neither  profit  nor  glory  in  a  war  with  Turkey.  The  Italian 
fleet  could  not  be  kept  under  steam  indefinitely.  The  Turk- 
ish fleet  did  not  come  out  to  give  battle,  and  the  Italians 
were  immobilized  at  the  mouth  of  the  Dardanelles.  Italian 
commerce  in  the  Black  Sea  and  the  eastern  Mediterranean 
was  at  a  standstill.  Upon  Italian  imports  Turkey  had 
placed  a  duty  of  one  hundred  per  cent.  Where,  outside  of 
Tripoli,  was  the  pressure  to  be  exercised? 

Italy  had  promised  before  the  war  started  that  she 
would  not  disturb  political  conditions  in  the  Balkan  pen- 
insula. The  alliance  with  Austria-Hungary  made  impos- 
sible operations  in  the  Adriatic.  A  naval  offensive  in  the 
^gean  would  open  up  international  complications  of  a 
kind  that,  owing  to  her  proximity  to  and  economic  rivalry 
with  Greece,  Italy  was  particularly  anxious  to  avoid.  In 
fact,  it  was  for  this  reason  that  the  Italian  government  had 
acted  in  harmony  with  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Russia 
in  preventing  Crete  from  repudiating  Ottoman  suzerainty. 
But  public  opinion  in  Italy  was  becoming  restless.  Were 
the  Italians  to  burden  themselves  with  heavy  taxes  by  pro- 
longing the  war  in  order  to  spare  the  feelings  of  the  great 
powers'?  Had  Russia  hesitated  in  the  Caucasus!  Had 
Great  Britain  hesitated  in  Egypt?  Had  Austria-Hungary 
hesitated  in  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina? 

Italy  was  at  war  with  Turkey.  She  had  control  of  the 
sea,  and  her  government's  hand  was  forced  to  risk  precipi- 
tating a  European  war  by  a  popular  clamor  that  would 
not  be  gainsaid.  In  April,  after  six  months  of  a  war  that 
was  no  war,  Italy  came  to  the  point  where  she  felt  she  must 
cast  all  scruples  to  the  winds.    A  direct  attack  upon  Tur- 


ITALY  REOPENS  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION       243 

key  was  decided  upon,  and  the  action  was  taken  that 
brought  Balkan  ambition  to  a  ferment  and  caused  the  kin- 
dling of  the  European  conflagration.  On  April  18  Admiral 
Viala  bombarded  the  forts  at  the  mouth  of  the  Dardanelles 
and  the  port  of  Vathy  in  Samos.  Four  days  later  Italian 
marines  disembarked  on  the  island  of  Stampalia.  On  May 
4  Rhodes  was  invaded,  a  battle  occurred  in  the  streets  of 
the  town,  and  the  Turks  were  driven  into  the  interior,  where 
they  surrendered  on  the  17th.  The  other  ten  islands  of  the 
Dodecannese,  at  the  mouth  of  the  ^gean  Sea,  were  occu- 
pied. The  dismemberment  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  at  its 
center,  which  had  been  arrested  at  San  Stefano  in  1878, 
began  again. 

Turkey  responded  to  the  bombardment  of  the  forts  by 
closing  the  Dardanelles,  and  to  the  occupation  of  Rhodes 
by  expelling  Italian  subjects.  All  Europe  was  disturbed 
by  the  holding  up  of  more  than  two  hundred  merchant- 
vessels  at  Constantinople.  Protests  were  in  vain.  Turkey 
reopened  the  straits  only  when  assurance  had  been  given 
to  her  that  the  attack  of  the  Italian  fleet  would  not  be  re- 
peated. Little  had  been  gained  as  far  as  hastening  peace 
was  concerned.  Because  she  knew  well  that  any  vital 
action,  such  as  the  bombardment  of  Saloniki  or  Smyrna  or 
the  invasion  of  European  Turkey  by  way  of  Albania  or 
Macedonia,  would  bring  on  a  general  European  war,  and 
that  Italy  was  unwilling  to  assume  this  responsibility, 
Turkey  remained  passive  and  unresisting.  She  felt, 
rightly,  that  the  Italians  would  fail  to  put  an  end  to  a 
guerrilla  warfare  that  had  the  oases  of  the  desert  as  a 
background. 

As  early  as  June,  Italian  and  Turkish  representatives 
met  informally  at  Ouchy,  Switzerland,  to  discuss  bases  for 
putting  an  end  to  a  war  that  had  degenerated  into  an  odd 
impasse.  Italian  commerce  was  suffering  and  Italian  war- 
ships were  in  need  of  the  dry-dock.  Although  Turkey 
could  no  longer  prevent  the  conquest  of  Tripoli  and  Ben- 


244  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ghazi,  Italy  believed  that  the  absence  of  Turkish  leader- 
ship in  keeping  the  tribes  in  the  interior  stirred  up,  and 
the  cessation  of  propaganda  against  the  occupation  on  the 
ground  of  religion,  would  help  greatly  toward  the  pacifica- 
tion of  the  provinces.  A  new  Albanian  revolt,  which  had 
assumed  alarming  proportions,  made  Turkey  anxious  for 
peace.  She  was  uncertain  also  of  Italy's  attitude  in  case 
of  an  outbreak  in  the  Balkans.  Unofficially,  Italy  had  let 
it  be  known  that  there  was  a  limit  to  patience,  and  that  a 
declaration  of  war  against  Turkey  by  the  Balkan  States 
would  find  Italy,  despite  European  considerations,  in  alli- 
ance with  them  against  her.  In  reality  the  Italian  minis- 
ters at  the  Balkan  courts  had  all  along  done  their  best  to 
keep  Greece  and  Bulgaria  from  taking  advantage  of  the 
situation.  This  had  been  especially  true  during  April  and 
May,  the  period  of  Italian  activity  in  the  ^gean.  On 
August  12  negotiations  were  begun  at  Ouchy  between  duly 
accredited  plenipotentiaries,  and  after  six  weeks  a  draft 
of  a  treaty  was  prepared,  which  was  accepted  by  Turkey 
under  pressure  of  the  new  war  in  the  Balkans.  On  October 
15,  1912,  the  treaty  of  Lausanne  (as  it  is  generally  called) 
was  signed. 

Nothing  was  said  in  the  instrument  about  a  cession  of 
territory,  and  Turkey  was  not  asked  to  recognize  the  Italian 
conquest.  But  Italy  bound  herself  to  assume  Tripoli's 
share  of  the  Ottoman  public  debt,  and  Turkey  granted 
complete  autonomy  to  Tripoli.  The  important  clause  of 
the  treaty  was  the  mutual  obligation  to  withdraw  the  Tur- 
kish army  from  Tripoli  and  Benghazi  and  the  Itahan  army 
from  the  islands  of  the  ^gean.  But  the  latter  was  to  be 
contingent  upon  the  former.  It  was  easy  enough  for  the 
Italians  to  quibble  later  about  the  meaning  of  '^Turkish." 
As  long  as  there  was  opposition  to  the  Italian  pacification, 
the  opponents  could  be  called  Turkish.  Italy  said  that  the 
holding  of  the  Dodecannese  was  to  bring  pressure  to  bear 
upon  the  Turks  to  prevent  sending  aid  and  encouragement 


ITALY  REOPENS  NEAR  EASTERN  QUESTION       245 

to  the  Tripolitans.  As  long  as  any  Arab  held  the  field 
against  the  Italian  army,  it  was  claimed  that  Turkey  had 
not  fulfilled  her  part  of  the  obligation.  At  the  moment  of 
signing  the  treaty  Turkey  was  willing  to  have  the  Italians 
stay  in  the  southern  islands  of  the  ^Egean,  trusting  to  for- 
tune to  get  them  out  later.  For  otherwise  the  Dodecannese 
would  have  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  Greeks  at  the  out- 
break of  the  Balkan  War  and  would  have  been  irrevocably 
lost. 

The  annexation  of  Tripoli  did  not  materially  affect  the 
development  of  international  politics  in  Africa.  Great 
Britain  and  France  had  already  agreed  upon  their  spheres 
of  influence,  and  the  new  Italian  possessions  had  no  un- 
settled boundaries  as  far  as  the  neighbors  were  concerned. 
Thus  there  was  no  cause  for  friction  among  the  powers 
interested  in  north  Africa,  and  no  modification  of  policies 
was  demanded.  In  Europe,  however,  the  attack  of  Italy 
upon  Turkey  led  directly  to  the  disruption  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire.  It  raised  among  the  powers  the  questions  they 
had  agreed  not  to  discuss.  ^Tien  it  was  discovered  that 
Turkey  was  being  driven  by  her  former  subjects  from  her 
European  provinces  and  from  the  JEgean  islands,  there 
arose  what  statesmen  had  feared — a  series  of  differences 
that  proved  impossible  of  peaceful  solution. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

INTRIGUES  OF  THE  GREAT  POWERS  IN  THE  BALKANS 

(1903-1912) 

THE  first  manifesto  of  the  Young  Turks  against  the 
absolutist  regime  was  made  in  June,  1900,  and  was  fol- 
lowed by  a  second  stronger  demand  for  reforms  a  year 
later.  The  persecution  of  Armenians,  however,  continued, 
and  to  the  count  against  Abdul  Hamid  were  added  massa- 
cres and  a  state  of  anarchy  that  seemed  to  have  been  delib- 
erately encouraged  in  European  Turkey.  In  November, 
1901,  the  sultan  received  a  warning  that  caused  him  to  be 
more  amenable  to  the  suggestions  of  the  powers.  In  the 
course  of  a  dispute  over  claims  and  French  religious  orders, 
France  had  broken  off  diplomatic  relations  with  Turkey, 
and  had  not  hesitated  to  go  to  the  length  of  making  a  naval 
demonstration  in  the  ^gean  Sea  and  seizing  the  island 
of  Mytilene  in  order  to  bring  the  Sublime  Porte  to  terms. 
From  no  other  power  did  Turkey  receive  encouragement 
to  reject  the  French  ultimatum.  Germany  was  in  the  midst 
of  an  industrial  depression  and  Great  Britain  had  not  yet 
reached  the  end  of  the  Boer  War.  In  1902  Great  Britain, 
France,  Russia,  and  Italy  joined  to  insist  upon  the  with- 
drawal of  the  Ottoman  garrison  from  Crete,  and  in  De- 
cember of  the  same  year  all  six  of  the  powers  told  Abdul 
Hamid  that  the  administration  of  Macedonia  must  be 
radically  improved. 

Abdul  Hamid  realized  that  while  he  could  ignore  the 
notes  of  the  powers  protesting  against  the  Armenian  mas- 
sacres, as  he  had  always  done,  since  only  humanitarian 
interests  were  involved,  he  did  not  hold  the  same  trump 
cards  as  formerly  in  regard  to  other  questions.    Because 

246 


THE  POWERS  IN  THE  BALKANS  (1903-1912)         247 

Eussia  and  France  were  now  allies,  Russia  no  longer 
backed  him  in  refusing  to  recognize  the  right  of  France  to 
protect  the  Catholics  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  Great 
Britain,  too,  was  drifting  into  an  understanding  with 
France  that  would  logically  be  followed  by  an  understand- 
ing with  Russia ;  while  Germany,  who  was  replacing  Great 
Britain  as  Turkey's  friend  and  defender,  did  not  possess 
the  naval  strength  or  the  opportunities  to  stir  up  colonial 
difficulties  that  had  made  it  a  life-saving  pastime  for  the 
master  of  Yildiz  Kiosk  to  set  off  Great  Britain  against 
Russia  and  France. 

Most  important  of  all,  the  preoccupations  of  Russia  in 
the  Far  East  had  brought  together  the  Romanoff  czar  and 
the  Hapsburg  emperor  in  a  definite  agreement  concern- 
ing Balkan  affairs.  At  first,  when  an  Albanian  uprising 
was  added  to  the  Macedonian  revolt  to  throw  all  European 
Turkey  into  confusion  and  bloodshed,  Vienna  and  Petro- 
grad  united,  on  February  21,  1903,  to  proclaim  Austro- 
Russian  hegemony  over  the  vilayets  of  Saloniki,  Monastir, 
and  Kossovo.  This  plan  was  impossible  of  realization, 
not  only  because  of  its  inherent  impracticability,  but  also 
because  of  the  opposition  of  the  other  powers.  It  was  too 
much  to  expect  either  that  Austro-Hungarians  and  Rus- 
sians would  be  able  to  work  together  harmoniously  in  the 
establishment  of  virtual  condominium  over  the  three  prov- 
inces, or  that  the  other  four  powers  could  agree  to  let  them 
have  an  opportunity  to  divide  the  Balkans  into  spheres  of 
influence.  Germany  made  no  move  on  one  side  or  the  other 
of  the  Macedonian  question,  just  as  in  the  Cretan  question 
she  had  not  supported  Greeks,  Cretans,  Turks,  or  the 
powers.  Great  Britain  and  France  recognized  the  special 
interests  of  Austria-Hungary  and  Russia  in  the  Balkans, 
and  were  willing  that  these  two  powers  should  be  the  ' '  man- 
datories" of  Europe  in  suggesting  and  supervising  the  re- 
forms, but  they  wanted  a  part  in  their  execution.  Italy 
insisted  that  Albania  be  excluded  from  the  regions  in  which 


248         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Austria-Hungary  and  Eussia  were  to  be  given  a  privileged 
position.    A  glance  at  the  map  shows  the  reason  why. 

Czar  Nicholas  and  Emperor  Franz  Josef  met  at  Miirz- 
steg,  and  agreed  upon  a  scheme  of  reform,  called  the  Miirz- 
steg  program,  which  was  approved  by  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  Italy.  They  recommended  that  the  Ottoman 
governor,  especially  appointed  for  the  purpose  of  putting 
into  execution  reforms,^  should  be  assisted  by  a  Russian 
and  an  Austrian,  and  that  a  gendarmerie,  recruited  in 
Macedonia,  should  be  organized  under  the  command  of  a 
foreign  general  and  a  staff  of  foreign  officers.  Each  of  the 
five  powers  was  to  have  supervision  of  a  district.  This 
last  provision  indicated  the  fatal  weakness  of  the  scheme. 
It  was  a  compromise  between  the  powers,  dictated  by  con- 
siderations that  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  problem  the 
Miirzsteg  program  was  supposed  to  solve,  and  thus  it  be- 
came merely  another  chapter  of  failure  in  the  story  of 
European  diplomacy  in  the  Near  East. 

From  the  moment  that  Abdul  Hamid  found  himself  com- 
pelled to  accept  the  policing  of  Macedonia  by  European 
officers,  he  set  to  work  to  make  their  task  impossible.  An 
agreement  was  soon  reached  between  Hilmi  Pasha,  the 
Ottoman  governor,  and  Austro-Hungarian  agents  in  Mace- 
donia. Where  the  Bulgarians  were  weak  the  Turkish  offi- 
cials and  the  Austrian  emissaries  encouraged  the  Bulgarian 
propaganda.  Where  the  Greeks  were  weak,  Hellenic  bands 
were  allowed  immunity.  Where  the  Serbians  were  weak, 
the  Serbian  propaganda  made  great  strides  with  the  con- 
nivance of  the  Turkish  government.  The  European  gen- 
darmerie was  powerless  to  struggle  against  Ottoman,  Aus- 
tro-Hungarian, and  Balkan  intrigues.  The  Turks  wanted 
to  keep  Macedonia,  the  Balkan  States  wanted  to  wrest  it 

*  In  the  autumn  of  1902  Abdul  Hamid,  thinking  to  anticipate  the  demands  of 
the  powers,  elaborated  his  own  program  of  reforms,  and  sent  to  Saloniki 
Hilmi  Pasha,  one  of  his  most  astute  servants,  who  was  to  reestablish  order  in 
Macedonia  "by  assuring  security  of  life  and  property  and  impartial  justice 
to  all  elements  of  the  population. ' ' 


THE  POWERS  IN  THE  BALKANS  (1903-1912)        249 

from  Turkey,  each  intending  to  get  the  lion's  share;  and 
Austria-Hungarj^,  whose  existence  under  the  form  of  a 
dual  monarchy  was  dependent  upon  the  inability  of  the 
Serbians  to  lead  a  movement  for  the  emancipation  of  the 
Jugo-Slavs,  aimed  to  keep  Macedonia  as  it  was — a  breed- 
ing-ground for  hatred  among  the  Balkan  peoples. 

Greece,  Serbia,  and  Bulgaria  were  alike  guilty  of  sub- 
sidizing bands  of  armed  men  who  imagined  that  they  were 
fulfilling  a  patriotic  duty  by  forcing  their  particular  na- 
tionality upon  ignorant  peasants,  most  of  whom  did  not 
know  or  care  to  what  ''nation"  they  belonged.  The  meth- 
ods and  actions  of  the  different  bands  were  the  same — 
pillage,  incendiarism,  and  assassination.  Wlien  Christian 
propagandists  let  them  alone,  the  Macedonians  had  to 
endure  similar  brutal  treatment  from  Moslem  Albanians 
and  from  the  Turkish  soldiery. 

In  order  to  give  the  ''reforms"  of  the  program  of  Miirz- 
steg  a  chance,  Athens,  Sofia,  and  Belgrade  ostensibl}''  with- 
drew their  active  support  of  the  bands.  The  Macedonians 
themselves  were  opposed  to  the  partition  of  their  country, 
and  asked  for  its  autonomy  under  a  Christian  governor 
and  with  the  guaranty  of  the  powers.  But  Greece  and 
Serbia  were  afraid  that  this  would  mean  a  repetition  of 
the  history  of  Eastern  Eumelia,  i.  e.,  eventual  union  w^ith 
Bulgaria.  This  was  in  itself  a  confession  of  the  prepon- 
derance of  the  Bulgarian  element  in  the  province.  The 
powers  rightly  suspected  that  if  Macedonia  became  a  united 
and  prosperous  country,  Austria-Hungary  and  Russia 
would  come  to  blows  over  its  future. 

After  her  disasters  in  the  Far  East,  Russia  returned  to 
the  intrigues  of  the  Balkans.  Because  she  could  not  con- 
trol Bulgaria,  and  because  the  fostering  of  Jugo-Slavic  na- 
tionalism seemed  to  furnish  an  opportunity  for  political 
and  economic  penetration  to  the  Adriatic  Sea,  and  at  the 
same  time  raised  a  formidable  barrier  against  Austrian 
penetration  to  the  -^gean  Sea  and  the  German  dream  of 


250         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

linking  Berlin  with  Constantinople  and  Bagdad,  Russian 
diplomacy  encouraged  the  pan-Serbian  movement. 

When  the  Young  Turks  got  control  of  the  Ottoman  gov- 
ernment in  1908,  a  serious  effort  was  made  to  reestablish 
Turkish  authority  in  Macedonia  and  Albania.  Austria- 
Hungary  immediately  annexed  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina 
and  Bulgaria  proclaimed  her  independence.  Realizing  that 
their  conflicting  ambitions  and  their  secret  commitments 
were  leading  them  to  a  war  for  which  none  of  them  was 
prepared,  the  statesmen  of  the  powers  decided  upon  a 
''hands  off"  policy  in  European  Turkey,  believing  that  the 
Young  Turks  might  possibly  solve  the  problem.  After 
all,  it  was  better  to  have  the  sultan  of  Turkey  become  again 
the  effective  ruler  of  Thrace,  Macedonia,  and  Albania  than 
to  prepare  for  and  wage  the  inevitable  war  that  would 
follow  the  aggrandizement  of  the  Balkan  States  and  the 
divergent  ambitions  of  Austria-Hungary  and  Russia. 
Great  Britain  and  France,  whose  principal  interests  lay 
in  other  parts  of  the  world,  were  sincere  in  this  belief, 
as  was  Germany,  who  felt  that  the  dismemberment  of  Tur- 
key would  work  to  the  disadvantage  of  her  plans  in  the 
Near  East.  But  Russia  and  Austria-Hungary  remained 
suspicious  of  each  other,  and  Italy  could  not  make  up  her 
mind  which  was  the  lesser  evil — the  extension  of  Austro- 
Hungarian  influence  in  the  Adriatic  or  the  success  of  the 
Jugo-Slavic  aspirations,  behind  which  stood  Russia.  She 
could  only  adopt  a  policy  of  watchful  waiting,  and  hope  to 
avoid  both  evils. 

This  situation  might  have  lasted  indefinitely,  had  not 
the  Young  Turks  failed  to  establish  constitutional  govern- 
ment and  had  not  the  fonr  ''protecting  powers"  (Great 
Britain,  France,  Russia,  and  Italy)  refused  to  cease  op- 
posing the  union  of  Crete  with  Greece.  The  attempt  of  the 
Young  Turks  to  found  the  constitutional  regime  upon 
the  bases  of  Turkish  domination  and  the  abrogation  of  the 
special  religious  and  political  privileges   of  non-Turkish 


THE  POWERS  IN  THE  BALKANS  (1903-1912)       251 

elements  led  to  a  renewal  of  persecution  and  massacre  in 
Macedonia  and  to  annual  revolts  in  Albania.^  The  nega- 
tive policy  of  the  protecting  powers  in  Crete  caused  a  ten- 
sion in  Greco-Turkish  relations  that  made  the  Greeks  see 
the  necessity  of  a  Balkan  alliance.^  The  Balkan  States, 
despite  their  own  differences,  formed  a  coalition  against 
Turkey  and  took  the  solution  of  the  Macedonian  question 
into  their  own  hands.  The  war  of  Italy  against  Turkey 
and  the  revolts  of  Albanians  and  Arabs  so  weakened  the 
Ottoman  military  and  nrval  power  from  1910  to  1912  that 
the  Balkan  States  were  tempted  to  seize  the  opportunity  to 
attack  their  common  enemy. 

Italy  did  not  encourage  them  to  follow  her  example,  and 
the  other  powers  were  equally  unwilling  to  countenance  war 
in  the  Balkans.  But  when  Bulgaria,  Serbia,  Greece,  and 
Montenegro  decided  that  peace  could  be  preserved  only  by 
the  actual  application  under  sufficient  guaranties  of  sweep- 
ing reforms  in  Macedonia,  and  appealed  to  the  powers 
to  indorse  their  demand  for  a  pro^dncial  Macedonian 
assembly,  a  militia  recruited  within  the  province,  and  a 
Christian  governor,  European  diplomacy  once  more  failed. 
The  great  powers,  as  usual,  tried  to  carry  water  on  both 
shoulders.  Blind  to  the  fact  that  inaction  and  vague  prom- 
ises would  no  longer  keep  in  check  the  neighbors  of  Tur- 
key, they  urged  the  Balkan  States  to  refrain  from  ^' being 
insistent"  and  pointed  out  to  Turkey  the  '^advisability" 
of  making  concessions.  The  Turks  did  not  believe  in  the 
genuineness  of  the  Balkan  alliance.  Neither  the  Balkan 
States  nor  Turkey  had  consideration  for  the  threats  or 
promises  or  offers  of  assistance  of  the  powers. 

When  the  Balkan  States  mobilized  at  the  end  of  Septem- 
ber, 1912,  and  not  until  then,  the  powers  realized  that  they 
were  losing  control  of  the  situation.  The  question  of  re- 
forms in  Macedonia  had  been  so  long  their  prerogative, 
and  they  were  so  accustomed  to  count  upon  the  little  Balkan 

^  See  pp.  224-227.  '  See  p.  223. 


252         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

peoples  to  remain  weak  and  divided,  that  they  refused  to 
believe  that  promises  and  threats  would  not  prevent  war. 
On  the  morning  of  October  8  the  ministers  of  Russia  and 
Austria-Hungary,  acting  in  the  name  of  the  six  great 
powers,  handed  in  at  Sofia,  Athens,  Belgrade,  and  Cettinje 
the  following  note : 

''The  Russian  and  Austro-Hungarian  Governments  de- 
clare to  the  Balkan  States : 

'*!.  That  the  powers  condemn  energetically  every  meas- 
ure capable  of  leading  to  a  rupture  of  peace ; 

^'2.  That,  supporting  themselves  on  Article  23  of  the 
treaty  of  Berlin,  they  will  take  in  hand,  in  the  interest 
of  the  populations,  the  realization  of  the  reforms  in  the  ad- 
ministration of  European  Turkey,  on  the  understanding 
that  these  reforms  will  not  diminish  the  sovereignty  of 
His  Imperial  Majesty  the  Sultan  and  the  territorial  integ- 
rity of  the  Ottoman  Empire;  this  declaration  reserves, 
also,  the  liberty  of  the  powers  for  the  collective  and  ulterior 
study  of  the  reforms ; 

"3.  That  if,  in  spite  of  this  note,  war  does  break  out  be- 
tween the  Balkan  States  and  the  Ottoman  Empire,  they 
will  not  admit,  at  the  end  of  the  conflict,  any  modification 
in  the  territorial  status  quo  in  European  Turkey. 

' '  The  powers  will  make  collectively  to  the  Sublime  Porte 
the  steps  which  the  preceding  declaration  makes  neces- 
sary. ' ' 

The  shades  of  San  Stefano,  Berlin,  Cyprus  and  Egypt, 
the  Armenian  massacres,  Mytilene  and  Miirzsteg,  the  Bag- 
dad Railway,  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  Tripoli  and  Rhodes, 
haunted  this  declaration  and  made  it  impotent,  honest  ef- 
fort though  it  was  to  preserve  the  peace  of  Europe.  It 
was  thirty-six  years  too  late.  Although  the  powers  were 
not  aware  of  it,  the  Balkan  States  had  become  strong 
enough  to  dispense  with  Europe;  on  the  other  hand,  Tur- 
key was  far  weaker  than  they  believed  her  to  be.  Euro- 
pean diplomacy  in  Crete  and  Macedonia  had  demonstrated 
to  the  Balkan  peoples  the  hopelessness  of  expecting  relief 
for  their  suffering  from  Europe.    It  was  natural  that  they 


THE  POWERS  IN  THE  BALKANS  (1903-1912)       253 

should  repudiate  the  arguments  that  European  statesmen 
used  to  justify  temporizing  with  and  condoning  the  crimes 
of  Turkey.  ''If  we  attempt  to  solve  the  Near  Eastern 
question  by  emancipating  the  Christian  subject  races,  we 
know  that  we  shall  fall  out  with  one  another,  and  thus 
precipitate  a  European  war,"  argued  the  great  powers, 
''and  is  it  not  better  for  a  few  people  to  be  the  victims  of 
Turkey  than  to  have  all  Europe  on  fire?"  The  "few 
people"  of  the  Balkans  were  unwilling  to  continue  to  be  the 
vicarious  sacrifice  to  the  exigences  of  world  politics  any 
longer  than  they  had  to  be.  The  great  powers  always 
thought  of  the  consequences  to  themselves  rather  than  to 
others  when  they  adopted  their  policies.  It  was  human  na- 
ture that  the  Balkan  States  should  do  the  same. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

THE  BALKAN  WAR  AGAINST  TURKEY  (1912-1913) 

THE  possibility  of  a  Balkan  alliance  depended  upon 
Greece.  For,  no  matter  how  large  and  powerful  an 
army  Bulgaria  and  Serbia  might  raise,  the  cooperation  of 
the  Greek  navy,  which  would  prevent  the  use  of  the  ^gean 
ports  of  the  Macedonian  littoral  for  disembarking  troops 
from  Asia,  was  essential  to  success.  Railways  from  the 
interior  of  Asia  Minor  had  Smyrna  as  their  terminus,  and 
from  the  interior  of  Macedonia,  Saloniki.  The  two  ports 
were  only  twelve  hours  apart.  The  armies  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire  were  large  and  were  reputed  to  be  well  trained  and 
equipped  with  modern  artillery.  If  Turkey  were  allowed 
the  opportunity  of  mobilizing  and  transporting  her  Asiatic 
forces,  the  military  position  of  the  Balkan  States,  even  if 
initial  victories  were  won,  would  become  precarious  after 
Turkey  brought  up  her  reserves.  When  the  Greeks, 
despite  their  fears  for  the  future  of  Macedonia,  were  con- 
verted to  the  idea  of  an  alliance  with  the  Slavic  Balkan 
States,  discussion  of  an  ultimatum  to  Turkey,  backed  by 
the  threat  of  military  action,  became  practicable.  It  is  not 
too  much  to  say  that  the  attitude  of  the  Young  Turks 
towards  Crete  and  their  boycott  of  Greek  commerce  were 
factors  directly  responsible  for  the  downfall  of  the  empire. 
The  Balkan  premiers  arrived  at  an  agreement  for  com- 
mon diplomatic  and  military  measures  against  Turkey  with- 
out having  settled  their  own  differences.  There  was  no 
understanding  as  to  the  future  of  Thrace  and  Albania  and 
as  to  the  partition  of  Macedonia  in  event  of  driving  the 
Turks  out  of  Europe.  Greece  and  Montenegro  did  not 
conclude  treaties  with  Serbia  and  Bulgaria.    The  only  defi^ 

254 


BALKAN  WAR  AGAINST  TURKEY  (1912-1913)       255 

nite  agreement  concerning  territorial  settlements  was  be- 
tween Bulgaria  and  Serbia ;  but  even  in  the  Serbo-Bulgarian 
treaty  a  large  and  important  zone  was  left  to  arbitration. 
It  was  the  best  that  could  be  done.  The  Balkan  statesmen 
decided  that  it  was  wise  to  defer  discussion,  remembering 
that 

"The  man  that  once  did  sell  the  lion's  skin 
While  the  beast  lived,  was  killed  with  hunting  him.'* 

None  of  them,  in  fact,  believed  that  the  lion  could  be  killed, 
and  they  all  hoped  to  avoid  war.  But  Turkey  acted  so  tact- 
lessly and  stubbornly  in  the  summer  of  1912  that  public 
sentiment  in  the  four  countries  compelled  the  carrying  out 
of  plans  that  had  been  made  only  tentatively  and  for  the 
purpose  of  exercising  diplomatic  pressure. 

Massacres  at  Ishtib  and  Kotchana  inflamed  the  Serbians 
and  Bulgarians.  The  perennial  Albanian  uprising,  which 
the  Turks  tried  to  render  impotent  by  arousing  religious 
fanaticism,  caused  persecutions  of  Greeks,  Montenegrins, 
and  Serbians.^  All  the  Christians  of  European  Turkey 
were  goaded  to  desperation  by  the  colonization  in  their 
midst  of  refugees  from  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina  ^  and  by 
the  fact  and  methods  of  conscription  for  the  Ottoman 
army.  The  demand  for  intervention  on  behalf  of  Mace- 
donian and  Epirote  Christians  became  irresistible  when  the 
people  realized  that  their  statesmen  had  actually  worked 
out  a  plan  for  military  cooperation.    Had  the  ministries  re- 

*  The  Albanian  insurgents  pillaged  the  frontier  towns  of  Montenegro  and 
the  districts  of  western  Macedonia,  which  they  had  invaded  with  the  object 
of  driving  back  the  Turks.  In  September  they  were  in  virtual  possession  of 
TJskub,  an  important  city  on  the  Vardar  Eiver,  through  which  passed  the  rail- 
way from  Nish  to  Saloniki.  The  idea  of  a  strong  and  independent  Albania 
was  as  alarming  to  the  Montenegrins  and  the  Serbians  as  its  alternative — 
success  of  the  Young  Turks  in  reestablishing  effective  control  of  the  European, 
vilayets  west  of  the  Vardar. 

'  Like  the  Boers  at  the  advance  of  the  English,  the  fanatical  elements  of  the 
Mohammedan  population  were  in  the  habit  of  "trekking"  from  the  provinces 
that  passed  under  Christian  control.  The  muhadjirs  (refugees)  were  naturally 
filled  with  hatred  for  Christians  and  believed  that  where  Mohammedanism  still 
prevailed  they  had  the  right  to  oust  the  Christian  population,  taking  their 
lands  and  homes  and  possessions. 


256         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

mained  advocates  of  peace,  they  would  have  fallen.  The 
only  hope  for  preserving  peace  would  have  been  a  concilia- 
tory attitude  on  the  part  of  Turkey.  When  the  great 
powers  presented  their  joint  note  on  October  8,  the  oppor- 
tunity for  mediation  had  passed.^ 

Montenegro  responded  to  the  overtures  of  the  powers 
by  declaring  war  immediately.  After  five  days,  which,  in 
view  of  public  opinion,  was  as  long  as  they  dared  wait,  the 
Balkan  premiers  notified  the  powers  that  their  offer  to  take 
in  hand  Macedonian  reforms  was  unacceptable.  The  next 
day,  October  14,  Serbia,  Greece,  and  Bulgaria  issued  an 
ultimatum  that  made  the  world  gasp. 

Turkey  was  given  forty-eight  hours  to  agree  to  (1)  the 
autonomy  of  the  European  provinces  under  Christian  gov- 
ernors; (2)  the  occupation  of  the  provinces  by  the  allied 
armies  while  the  reforms  were  being  applied;  (3)  the  pay- 
ment of  an  indemnity  for  the  expenses  of  mobilization;  (4) 
immediate  demobilization  of  the  Ottoman  army;  and  (5) 
a  pledge  that  the  reforms  would  be  effected  within  six 
months.  The  Ottoman  ministers  at  Belgrade  and  Sofia  re- 
fused to  transmit  the  ultimatum.  The  minister  at  Athens 
tried  to  detach  the  Greeks  from  the  alliance  by  agreeing 
to  recognize  the  annexation  of  Crete  to  Greece  and  prom- 
ising an  autonomous  government  for  some  of  the  ^gean 
islands.  But  the  Montenegrins  had  been  fighting  for  a 
week  and  had  scored  initial  successes.  On  the  15th  hos- 
tilities began  on  the  Serbian  frontier.  The  Bulgarian  and 
Greek  armies  were  being  assembled  for  the  invasion  of 
Thrace  and  Macedonia.  Three  days  later  Turkey  declared 
war  on  Bulgaria  and  Serbia,  though  she  still  cherished  the 
hope  of  buying  the  neutrality  of  Greece.  As  soon,  how- 
ever, as  Greece  learned  of  the  action  of  the  Sublime  Porte 
in  regard  to  Serbia  and  Bulgaria,  the  Ottoman  minister  in 
Athens  was  handed  his  passports. 

The  Bulgarians  crossed  the  Turkish  frontier  on  October 

*  For  the  text  of  this  note  see  p.  252. 


BALKAN  WAR  AGAINST  TURKEY  (1912-1913)       257 

19.  Within  two  weeks  they  had  invested  Adrianople,  had 
routed  the  Turks  at  Kirk  KiUsse  and  Lule  Burgas  (this 
battle  lasted  three  days  and  was  fought  by  350,000  com- 
batant troops,  almost  evenly  divided),  and  were  pursuing 
the  Turks  to  the  gates  of  Constantinople.  During  the  same 
fortnight  the  Ottoman  forces  in  Macedonia  were  as  de- 
cisively defeated  by  the  Serbians  at  Kumanovo  on  October 
22  and  by  the  Greeks  at  Yanitza  on  November  3.  During 
November  the  Turkish  armies  were  bottled  up  in  Constan- 
tinople, Adrianople,  Janina,  and  Scutari,  with  no  hope  of 
making  successful  sorties.  Except  at  Constantinople,  they 
were  besieged  and  could  hope  for  neither  reinforcements 
nor  food  supplies.  The  Greek  fleet  was  master  of  the 
^gean  Sea,  and  held  the  Turkish  navy  blocked  in  the 
Dardanelles.  All  the  ^gean  islands,  aside  from  those  oc- 
cupied by  Italy,  were  in  the  hands  of  the  Greeks.^  There 
had  been  less  than  six  weeks  of  fighting.  The  Balkan  allies 
had  swept  from  the  field  all  the  Turkish  forces  in  Europe 
and  the  military  prestige  of  Turkey  had  received  a  mortal 
blow. 

The  conditions  of  the  armistice,  signed  on  December  3, 
were  an  acknowledgment  of  the  debacle  of  Turkish  military 
power  in  Europe.  The  most  humiliating  stipulation  was 
that  the  Bulgarian  army  outside  Constantinople  should  be 
revictualed  by  the  railway  which  passed  under  the  guns 
of  Adrianople,  while  that  fortress  remained  without  food. 
By  agreement  with  her  alHes,  Greece  refused  to  sign  the 
armistice,  but  was  allowed  to  be  represented  at  the  peace 
conference.  The  allies  felt  that  the  state  of  war  on  sea 
must  continue,  to  prevent  Turkey  during  the  armistice 
from  bringing  to  Europe  the  army  corps  of  Syria,  Meso- 
potamia, and  Arabia;  and  Greece,  in  particular,  was  de- 
termined to  run  no  risk  in  connection  with  the  JEgean 
islands.     The  plenipotentiaries  were  to  meet  in  London. 

*  At  Chios  the  Turkish  garrison  retired  to  the  mountainous  center  of  the 
island  and  was  able  to  hold  out  until  January  3. 


258         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WOBLD  POLITICS 

The  delegates  of  the  Balkan  States  insisted  upon  the 
surrender  of  Adrianople  and  the  other  fortresses  that 
were  still  holding  out,  and  the  cession  to  the  allies  of  the 
Ottoman  territories  in  Europe  beyond  a  line  running  from 
Enos  on  the  ^gean  Sea,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Maritza  River, 
to  Midia  on  the  Black  Sea,  and  of  all  the  ^gean  islands. 
After  a  vain  attempt  to  save  something  from  the  wreck 
by  dividing  the  allies  and  securing  the  intervention  of  the 
powers,  the  Turkish  government  decided  to  jdeld.  A  tele- 
gram was  sent  to  London,  authorizing  the  Turkish  commis- 
sioners to  sign  the  preliminaries  of  a  peace  that  would 
mean  the  elimination  of  Turkey  from  Europe,  with  the 
exception  of  a  strip  of  coast  along  the  Dardanelles,  the 
Sea  of  Marmora,  and  the  Bosphorus.  But  the  next  day, 
January  22,  1913,  a  coup  d'etat  at  Constantinople,  engi- 
neered by  Enver  Bey,  a  hero  of  the  revolution  of  1908,^ 
overthrew  the  government.  Nazim  Pasha,  minister  of  war 
and  generalissimo  of  the  Ottoman  army,  was  assassinated, 
and  Kiamil  Pasha,  the  grand  vizier,  was  exiled.  The  new 
government,  headed  by  General  Mahmud  Shevket  Pasha, 
revoked  the  authorization  to  sign  peace  on  the  terms  laid 
down  by  the  allies. 

On  January  29  the  allies  denounced  the  armistice  and 
hostilities  reopened.  From  a  military  point  of  view,  the 
only  hope  of  the  Turks  lay  in  advancing  from  Constanti- 
nople or  Gallipoli  to  the  relief  of  Adrianople.  There  was 
much  talk  of  a  great  offensive  movement,  but  no  serious 
attempt  was  made  against  the  army  besieging  Constanti- 
nople, while  an  attack  upon  the  Bulgarians  at  Bulair,  where 
the  Gallipoli  peninsula  joins  the  mainland,  ended  disas- 

*  After  the  revolution  Enver  Bey  was  given  the  post  of  military  attach^  at 
Berlin.  When  Italy  attacked  Turkey,  he  returned  and  went  to  organize  the 
resistance  in  Tripoli.  The  misfortunes  of  the  opening  weeks  of  the  Balkan 
War  gave  him  the  opportunity  to  come  to  the  front  as  leader  of  the  jingo  and 
extreme  nationalist  element  of  the  Young  Turk  party.  Mahmud  Shevket,  v:Ynm 
he  made  premier  through  his  coup  d'etat,  was,  like  himself,  an  advocate  of  an 
alliance  with  Germany. 


BALKAN  WAR  AGAINST  TURKEY  (1912-1913)       259 

trously.  The  Greeks  captured  Janina  on  March  5,  and  the 
Bulgarians  and  Serbians  took  Adrianople  by  assault  on 
March  24  and  25.  Scutari  in  Albania  surrendered  to  the 
Montenegrins  on  April  22.  In  Europe  the  Ottoman  flag  had 
ceased  to  wave,  except  at  Constantinople  and  Gallipoli. 
The  war  was  over,  whether  the  Young  Turks  would  have 
it  so  or  not. 

The  great  powers  were  willing  to  act  as  mediators.  But 
the  Turks  refused  to  discuss  the  terms  of  peace  until  after 
the  fall  of  Janina  and  Adrianople,  and  the  Balkan  States 
rejected  the  demand  of  the  powers  that  the  status  and 
frontiers  of  Albania  and  the  disposal  of  the  JEgean  islands 
be  left  to  them.  They  wanted  to  know  what  the  powers 
had  in  mind  in  regard  to  the  Albanian  frontiers,  and  they 
did  not  see  why  the  powers  should  claim  any  rights  in  the 
-^gean  islands.  The  powers  also,  in  the  interests  of 
holders  of  Turkish  bonds,  insisted  that  an  indemnity  be 
waived  and  that  the  allies  assume  a  portion  of  the  Ottoman 
debt,  as  Italy  had  done  in  the  treaty  of  Lausanne,  ad- 
judged on  the  basis  of  the  size  and  resources  of  the  terri- 
tories annexed  by  each  of  them. 

Notes  were  exchanged  among  the  chancelleries  until 
April  20,  when  the  Balkan  States  finally  agreed  to  accept 
mediation  of  the  powers.  After  all,  the  victory  had  been 
far  more  complete  than  they  expected,  and,  although  they 
felt  that  the  interference  of  the  powers  would  inevitably 
lead  to  difficulties,  they  could  not  afford  to  hold  out  longer. 
Differences  among  themselves  were  threatening  to  destroy 
the  united  diplomatic  front  which  till  now  they  had  been 
able  to  maintain  with  as  much  success  as  their  military 
front.  Negotiations  were  resumed  in  London  on  May  20, 
and  ten  days  later  the  peace  preliminaries  were  signed. 
The  sultan  of  Turkey  ceded  to  the  sovereigns  of  the  allied 
states  his  dominions  in  Europe  beyond  the  Enos-Midia  line, 
and  the  island  of  Crete.    The  future  of  the  other  islands 


260         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

of  the  ^gean  Sea  was  left  to  the  great  powers,  and  to  them 
also  was  intrusted  the  task  of  creating  an  Albanian  state 
and  determining  its  frontiers. 

These  terms  were  almost  identical  with  those  rejected 
by  the  Young  Turks  in  January.  The  war  had  been  re- 
newed in  the  hope  that  the  allies  would  turn  their  arms 
against  each  other.  This  did  happen,  but  not  until  Turkey 
had  been  disposed  of. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

THE  BALKAN  TANGLE  (1913-1914) 

IF  the  great  powers  were  unprepared  for  the  succession 
of  Balkan  triumphs  in  October  and  November,  1912, 
the  allies  were  more  astonished  at  what  they  had  been  able 
to  accomplish.  Kirk  Kilisse  and  Lule  Burgas  gave  Thrace 
to  Bulgaria.  Kumanovo  opened  up  the  valley  of  the  Vardar 
to  Serbia.  The  Greeks  were  able  to  march  to  Saloniki  with- 
out serious  opposition. 

The  victories  of  the  Serbians  and  Greeks,  won  with  com- 
parative ease,  were  to  the  Bulgarians  a  calamity  that  over- 
shadowed their  own  magnificent  military  successes.  They 
had  spilled  much  blood  and  w^asted  their  strength  in  the 
conquest  of  Thrace,  which  they  did  not  want,  while  their 
allies — but  rivals — were  in  possession  of  Macedonia,  the 
Bulgaria  irredenta.  To  be  investing  Adrianople  and  be- 
sieging Constantinople,  cities  in  which  they  had  only  a 
secondary  interest,  while  the  Serbians  attacked  Monastir 
and  the  Greeks  were  settling  themselves  permanently  in 
Saloniki,  cities  of  their  hearts'  desire,  was  the  irony  of 
fate.  Others  were  reaping,  the  Bulgars  naturally  felt,  the 
fruits  for  which  they  had  made  by  far  the  greatest  sacri- 
fice. Alacedonia,  and  not  Thrace,  was  the  country  that 
they  had  taken  arms  to  liberate.  The  ^^gean  Sea,  and  not 
the  extension  of  their  Black  Sea  littoral,  formed  the  sub- 
stantial and  logical  economic  background  to  the  appeal  of 
race  that  led  them  to  insist  so  strongly  that  they  had  the 
right  to  gather  under  their  sovereignty  all  the  elements  of 
the  Bulgarian  people. 

Moreover,  most  of  the  men  who  had  incited  Bulgaria  to 
fight  Turkey  and  had  contributed  so  greatly  to  her  suc- 

261 


262  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

cesses  were  of  Macedonian  origin.  The  Bulgarians  are  a 
peasant  people  attached  to  the  land.  When  the  treaty  of 
Berlin  restored  Macedonia  to  Turkey,  but  left  the  other 
portions  in  the  Bulgaria  of  the  treaty  of  San  Stefano 
autonomous,  it  was  natural  that  the  military  and  civilian 
officials  of  the  new  principality  should  be  recruited  largely 
from  Macedonian  refugees,  who,  having  abandoned  their 
land,  sought  as  a  means  of  livelihood  military  or  govern- 
ment service.  All  their  lives  they  had  been  looking  for- 
ward to  the  union  with  the  mother  country  of  the  regions 
from  which  they  came.  After  the  striking  victories  of  the 
Bulgarian  armies,  there  was  a  moment  of  insanity  when 
they  saw  the  dreams  of  a  lifetime  about  to  vanish. 

But  the  Greeks  and  Serbians  felt  the  same  way  about 
the  same  places.  Populations  had  been  intermingled  for 
centuries.  At  some  time  in  past  history  dynasties  of  each 
of  the  three  peoples  had  ruled  over  exactly  the  same  terri- 
tory. Greece  and  Serbia,  not  less  than  Bulgaria,  were  able 
to  evoke  historical  memories  of  Macedonia.  These  memo- 
ries had  been  enhanced  and  exaggerated  by  the  recent 
decades  of  rivalry,  and  it  is  impossible  to  overestimate  the 
bitterness  that  had  been  engendered  by  the  bloody  propa- 
ganda of  the  Macedonian  bands. ^ 

During  the  trying  period  of  negotiations  in  London  the 
jealousies  of  the  allies  had  been  awakened  one  against 
another.  Between  Greeks  and  Bulgarians  friction  had 
begun  from  the  moment  that  the  Greek  army  occupied  Salo- 
nika Between  Serbians  and  Bulgarians  relations  did  not 
become  strained  until  Serbia  saw  her  way  blocked  to  the 
Adriatic  by  the  decision  of  the  powers  to  create  a  free 
Albania.  Then  Serbia  began  to  insist  that  the  treaty  of 
partition  that  she  had  signed  with  Bulgaria  could  not  be 
carried  out.  According  to  the  Serbo-Bulgarian  treaty,  cen- 
tral and  western  Macedonia  were  divided  into  three  zones, 
the  middle  one  alone  being  reserved  for  arbitration  in  case 

^  See  p.  248. 


THE  BALKAN  TANGLE   (1913-1914)  263 

of  disagreement.  But  Serbia  claimed  that  Bulgaria  had 
Thrace,  with  an  outlet  to  the  ^gean  Sea  in  eastern  Mace- 
donia, while  the  intervention  of  the  powers,  which  had  not 
been  foreseen  in  the  Serbo-Bulgarian  treaty,  would,  if  it 
were  carried  out  literally,  leave  no  appreciable  gains  for 
Serbia.  She  insisted,  therefore,  upon  referring  to  the  arbi- 
tration of  the  czar  of  Russia  the  whole  question  of  partition 
and  not  simply  that  of  the  intermediate  zone.  In  this  con- 
tention Serbia  had  the  support  of  Greece,  who  did  not  care 
to  see  the  Bulgarians  in  occupation  of  a  strip  of  territory 
separating  Serbia  from  Greece  and  dominating  both  coun- 
tries through  the  possession  of  Monastir. 

In  the  middle  of  June,  1913,  it  was  announced  that  Greece 
and  Serbia,  to  thwart  the  Bulgarian  aspirations,  had  con- 
cluded an  alliance  for  ten  years.  Bulgaria  declined  to 
send  delegates  to  a  conference  proposed  by  Premier  Veni- 
zelos  for  the  purpose  of  arranging  the  new  frontiers 
amicably,  but  did  agree  to  meet  Serbia  and  Greece  in  a 
conference  at  Petrograd  in  response  to  a  moving  appeal 
from  Czar  Nicholas.  Notwithstanding  this  arrangement, 
which  would  have  avoided  a  fratricidal  war,  the  Bulgarian 
general  staff  yielded  to  pressure  of  the  Macedonian  party, 
and  a  general  attack  without  declaration  of  war,  or  even 
warning,  was  launched  on  June  29.  There  was  no  direct 
provocation  on  the  part  of  Bulgaria's  allies,  and  General 
Savoff,  who  gave  the  order,  explained  that  he  was  not  be- 
ginning the  war  but  was  merely  trying  to  occupy  as  much 
territory  as  possible  in  the  contested  regions  before  Russia 
or  the  other  powers  intervened.  He  aimed  to  cut  the  com- 
munications between  the  Greeks  and  Serbians  and  to  throw 
an  army  suddenly  into  Saloniki. 

No  diplomatic  action  followed  the  treachery  of  the  Bul- 
garians. The  surprise  attack  failed,  and  Bulgaria  was 
compelled  to  face  a  new  war.  Within  two  weeks  the  Bul- 
garians found  themselves  driven  back  to  their  old  boun- 
daries on  the  Macedonian  and  Serbian  fronts.     Only  the 


264         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

mountainous  character  of  the  country  saved  them  from 
being  routed.  In  the  middle  of  July  the  Serbians  crossed 
the  western  frontier  of  Bulgaria  and  on  July  23  invested 
Widin.  Bulgaria  might  have  rallied  and  might  have  rewon 
a  part  of  the  contested  territories  from  Greece  and  Serbia. 
But  the  invasion  of  Bulgaria  by  Rumania  made  her  situa- 
tion hopeless. 

Rumania  had  watched  with  alarm  the  rise  of  the  military 
power  of  Bulgaria,  and,  although  she  did  not  join  in  the 
war  against  Turkey,  she  had  notified  Bulgaria  in  January 
that  she  must  have  compensation  to  offset  the  increase  in 
territory  of  her  neighbor  in  Thrace  and  Macedonia.  She 
asked  Bulgaria  for  a  cession  of  territory  from  the  Danube 
at  Silistria  to  the  Black  Sea,  in  order  that  she  might  have 
the  strategic  frontier  which  the  Congress  of  Berlin  should 
have  given  her  when  she  was  awarded  the  Dobrudja,  with- 
out her  consent,  in  exchange  for  Bessarabia.  As  Rumania 
had  helped  to  free  Bulgaria  in  1877-78,  and  had  never  re- 
ceived any  reward  for  her  sacrifices,  while  the  Bulgarians 
had  done  little  to  win  their  own  independence,  the  demand 
for  a  rectification  of  frontier  was  historically  reasonable. 
Since  Rumania  had  admirably  developed  the  Dobrudja,  and 
had  constructed  the  port  of  Constanza  as  her  railway  ter- 
minus on  the  Black  Sea,  the  demand  was  justified  from  an 
economic  standpoint.  In  April  the  Bulgarians  gave  up 
Silistria  with  ill  grace,  but  refused  to  yield  the  small  strip 
of  territory  from  the  Danube  to  the  Black  Sea  asked  for 
by  Rumania.  It  was  a  fatal  political  mistake.  On  July  10 
Rumania  declared  war  and  crossed  the  Danube.  Five  days 
later  the  seaport  of  Varna  was  occupied.  The  Rumanians 
began  to  march  upon  Sofia.  Fighting  for  life  against  the 
Serbians  and  Greeks,  the  Bulgarians  had  no  army  to  op- 
pose the  Rumanian  invasion. 

It  would  have  been  easy  for  the  Rumanians  to  occupy 
Sofia  and  wait  there  for  the  Greek  and  Serbian  armies  to 
arrive.     The  humiliation  of  Bulgaria  could  have  been  made 


THE  BALKAN  TANGLE  (1913-1914)  265 

complete.  But  Rumania  had  intervened  for  a  limited  ob- 
jective, and  when  that  was  attained  it  was  not  to  her  inter- 
est to  aid  in  the  aggrandizement  of  Serbia  and  Greece.  She 
was  thinking  of  the  balance  of  power  in  the  BaH^ans ;  hence 
she  brought  strong  pressure  to  bear  upon  both  sides  for  the 
conclusion  of  an  armistice. 

On  August  1,  after  the  plenipotentiaries  had  assembled 
at  Bukharest,  an  armistice  was  signed.  The  Bulgarian 
delegates  had  to  come  to  an  understanding  with  each  ally 
separately.  Consequently  the  important  decisions  were 
made  in  committee  meetings.  The  general  assembly  had 
little  else  to  do  than  to  ratify  the  concessions  wrung  from 
Bulgaria  in  turn  by  each  of  the  opponents.  By  the  treaty 
of  Bukharest  on  August  10,  1913,  Bulgaria  abandoned 
most  of  Macedonia  to  Serbia  and  Greece,  including  the  val- 
ley of  the  Vardar  and  the  ports  of  Saloniki  and  Kavala  on 
the  ^gean.  The  cession  of  the  triangular  strip  of  territory 
in  the  Dobrudja  brought  the  frontier  of  Rumania  very 
near  to  Varna,  Bulgaria's  port  on  the  Black  Sea.  While 
Bulgaria  was  fighting  the  other  Balkan  states,  a  Turkish 
army  had  reoccupied  most  of  Thrace,  including  Adrianople, 
and  there  was  no  way  of  expelling  the  Turks.  This  left  to 
the  Bulgarians  only  a  narrow  strip  do^^^l  to  the  JEgean  Sea, 
with  the  single  port  of  Dedeagatch,  the  railway  to  which 
at  one  point  crossed  the  frontier  claimed  and  occupied  by 
Turkey.  In  all  the  territories  ceded  by  Bulgaria  to  her 
enemies,  the  majority  of  the  inhabitants  were  Bulgarians — 
or  were  believed  to  be  so  by  themselves  as  well  as  by  the 
Bulgarians.  The  punishment  was  undoubtedly  well  de- 
served, but  a  situation  was  created  that  maintained  the  old 
causes  of  friction  among  the  Balkan  peoples.  The  treaty 
of  Bukharest  was  not  a  real  peace,  but  was  an  armed  truce, 
and  it  proved  as  disastrous  to  the  reestablishment  of  good 
feeling  and  settled  political  and  economic  conditions  in  the 
Balkan  peninsula  as  had  the  treaty  of  Frankfort,  forty 
years  earlier,  in  western  Europe. 


266         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Of  the  intrigues  of  the  powers  at  Bukharest  during  the 
conference  much  has  been  written  but  little  is  actually 
known.  The  aggrandizement  of  Greece  was  viewed  with 
alarm  by  Italy  and  of  Serbia  by  Austria-Hungary;  Eu- 
mania,  on  the  other  hand,  was  presumably  an  outpost  of 
the  Triple  Alliance ;  the  breach  with  Bulgaria  was  looked 
upon  as  a  blow  to  pan-Slavism;  and  the  partial  recovery 
of  Turkey  was  gratifying  to  Germany. 

The  modifications  of  the  treaty  of  London,  by  which 
Turkey  got  back  most  of  Thrace,  Avere  arranged  in  a  Turko- 
Bulgarian  treaty,  which  was  not  submitted  to  the  powers 
or  to  the  other  Balkan  states  for  their  approval.  Greece 
also  was  compelled  to  enter  into  negotiations  with  the 
Sublime  Porte,  separately  and  without  the  intervention  of 
the  powers,  to  settle  a  number  of  questions  not  covered  by 
the  treaty  of  London,  especially  in  regard  to  the  ^gean 
islands.  A  satisfactory  settlement  between  Greece  and 
Turkey  had  not  been  reached  when  the  World  War  broke 
out.  Nor  had  Greece  succeeded  in  arriving  at  an  agree- 
ment with  Italy  concerning  the  future  of  the  Dodecannese, 
which  Italy  continued  to  occupy  on  the  ground  that  the 
terms  of  the  treaty  of  Ouchy  had  not  been  fulfilled. 

The  most  perplexing  Balkan  question,  however,  was  that 
of  Albania,  her  status  and  her  frontiers.  By  the  treaty  of 
London  the  Albanian  question,  including  the  delimitation 
of  the  frontiers  of  Albania,  had  been  left  to  the  great 
powers.  In  1815,  when  the  map  of  Europe  was  being  re- 
made by  the  Congress  of  Vienna,  Albania  did  not  command 
attention.  It  was  an  integral  part  of  the  Ottoman  Empire, 
and  the  political  changes  of  the  nineteenth  century,  which 
made  Albania  an  international  question,  had  not  yet  oc- 
curred. Italy  was  not  unified.  The  upper  part  of  the 
Adriatic  Sea  was  wholly  in  the  hands  of  Austria.  Greece 
had  not  yet  received  her  freedom,  and  the  Serbians  had 
not  risen  in  rebellion  against  the  Ottoman  Empire.  There 
were  no  Italian,  Hellenic,  and  Slavic  questions  to  disturb 


THE  BALKAN  TANGLE  (1913-1914)  267 

Austria  in  her  peaceful  possession  of  the  Adriatic  Sea. 
But  when  the  union  of  Italy  had  been  accomplished,  and 
Serbia  Montenegro,  and  Greece  were  independent  political 
units,  what  was  going  to  happen  to  Albania  became  a  ques- 
tion of  prime  importance  in  international  relations. 

Austria-Hungary  determined  that  Italy  should  not  get 
a  foothold  in  Albania,  and  Italy  had  the  same  determina-^ 
tion  in  regard  to  Austria-Hungary.  But  both  wanted  to 
keep  the  Slavs  from  reaching  the  Adriatic,  and  Italy  was 
anxious  to  prevent  the  extension  of  the  Greek  littoral 
northward  by  the  annexation  of  northern  Epirus  to  Greece. 
Instead  of  following  the  example  of  Russia  and  Great  Brit- 
ain in  Persia  and  establishing  spheres  of  influence,  the  two 
Adriatic  powers  agreed  to  support  the  Albanian  national 
movement  as  the  best  possible  check  upon  Serbian  and 
Greek  aspirations.  The  agreement  stood  the  strain  of 
Italy's  war  with  Turkey,  and,  largely  owing  to  fear  of 
Russia  and  pressure  from  Germany,  of  the  war  of  the 
Balkan  States  with  Turkey.  But  Italy  and  Austria- 
Hungary  let  it  be  known  to  the  other  powers  that  if  the 
Ottoman  Empire  in  Europe  disappeared,  there  must  be 
an  independent  Albania. 

The  dictum  was  accepted  in  principle.  No  nation  wanted 
to  fight  over  the  question  of  Albania.  Russia  could  not 
hope  to  have  support  from  Great  Britain  and  France  in 
imposing  upon  the  Triple  Alliance  her  desire  for  a  Slavic 
outlet  to  the  Adriatic;  neither  France  nor  Great  Britain 
wanted  the  Russians  to  get  to  the  Mediterranean.  The 
harmony  among  the  powers  on  the  Albanian  question  was 
shown  in  the  warning  given  to  Greece  and  Serbia  during 
the  peace  negotiations  with  Turkey,  and  stood  the  severe 
test  put  upon  it  by  the  Montenegrin  occupation  of  Scutari. 
Serbia,  yielding  to  the  intimation  from  Russia  that  her 
claim  on  northern  Albania  would  not  be  allowed  by  the 
powers,  had  withdrawn  her  troops  from  the  siege  of  Scutari 
^nd  had  abandoned  all  points  within  the  regions  she  real- 


268         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ized  would  be  given  to  the  state  that  the  powers  intended 
to  create.  It  was  when  Serbia  saw  the  hopelessness  of 
territorial  aggrandizement  in  Albania  that  her  attitude 
toward  fulfilling  the  terms  of  the  Serbo-Bulgarian  treaty 
became  uncompromising.  The  blocking  of  Serbia's  outlet 
to  the  Adriatic  by  the  powers  led  inevitably  to  the  war 
between  the  Balkan  allies. 

With  Montenegro  the  situation  was  different.  She  had 
no  hope  of  compensation  elsewhere.  She  had  sacrificed 
a  fifth  of  her  army  in  the  attacks  upon  Scutari,  which 
seemed  to  her  the  only  reward  that  she  was  to  get  out  of 
the  war  with  Turkey.  There  was  little  harm  that  the 
powers  could  do  to  her.  King  Nicholas  had  precipitated 
the  Balkan  War  against  the  advice  of  the  powers,  and  on 
April  1,  1913,  he  refused  to  obey  their  command  to  raise 
the  siege  against  Scutari.  The  powers  were  compelled  to 
make  a  show  of  force.  Little  Montenegro,  with  her  one 
port,  received  the  honor  of  an  international  blockade.  On 
April  7  an  international  fleet,  under  the  British  Admiral 
Burney,  blockaded  the  coast  from  Antivari  to  Durazzo. 
But  the  Montenegrins,  although  deserted  by  the  Serbians, 
maintained  their  circle  around  Scutari,  twenty-five  miles 
inland  from  the  blockading  fleet.  On  April  23,  after  the 
Balkan  War  was  finished,  Europe  was  electrified  by  the 
news  that  the  Albanians  had  surrendered  Scutari  to  Mon- 
tenegro. It  was  announced  at  Vienna  that  Austro-Hun- 
garian  troops  would  cross  the  border  from  Bosnia  into 
Montenegro  if  the  Montenegrins  did  not  immediately  with- 
draw from  Scutari.  This  action  would  certainly  have 
brought  on  the  European  war,  for,  had  it  been  consum- 
mated, Russia  would  have  declared  war  upon  Austria- 
Hungary.  But,  largely  through  the  influence  of  his  son- 
in-law,  the  king  of  Italy,  King  Nicholas  decided  before  it 
was  too  late  to  deliver  Scutari  to  the  powers.  On  May  5 
the  Montenegrins  withdrew,  and  ten  days  later  Scutari 
was  occupied  by  detachments  from  the  international  squad- 


THE 

BALKAN   PENINSULA 
IN1Q14 

.^...">UMOAIII£S  ACCenOINeTOTMe 

'•'■'■'■'  tucaty  or  ««  arnrAno-iara 

......  *<""'°""r5  ICCOnOINC  TO  THE 

T/tCATy  or  BERLIN- 1876 
BOUNOAKICS  ACCOROINC  TO  THE 

TREATIES  or  COHOOIV  t,eUXAREST-iyi3 


THE  BALKAN  TANGLE  (1913-1914)  269 

ron.  The  blockade  was  raised.  The  peace  of  Europe  was 
preserved. 

The  treaty  of  London  put  Albania  into  the  hands  of  the 
powers.  The  northern  and  eastern  frontiers  had  been  set- 
tled by  a  promise  made  to  Serbia  in  return  for  her  ^vith- 
drawal  from  the  siege  of  Scutari.  But  the  southern  fron- 
tier was  still  an  open  question.  Here  Italy  was  as  much 
interested  as  was  Austria-Hungary  in  the  north.  With 
Corfu  in  the  possession  of  Greece,  Italy  would  not  agree 
that  the  coast  and  the  mainland  opposite  should  also  be 
Hellenic.  The  Greeks,  on  the  contrary,  declared  that  the 
littoral  and  hinterland,  up  to  beyond  Santi  Quaranta,  was 
part  of  ancient  Epirus  and  was  inhabited  principally  by 
Greeks.  It  should  therefore  revert  logically  to  Greece. 
The  Greeks  were  occupying  Santi  Quaranta.  They  claimed 
the  right  of  extending  their  frontiers  as  far  north  as  Argy- 
rokastron.  But  they  consented  to  withdraw  from  the  Adri- 
atic coast,  north  of  and  opposite  Corfu,  if  points  equally 
far  to  the  north  were  left  to  them.  An  international  com- 
mission was  formed  to  delimit  the  southern  boundaries  of 
Albania,  but  its  task  was  never  satisfactorily  completed.^ 

The  new  state,  foster-child  of  all  Europe,  had  indefinite 
boundaries;  each  guardian  was  jealous  of  the  others;  and 
its  neighbors  were  waiting  only  for  a  favorable  moment  to 
partition  it.  Inhabited  by  two  races  and  divided  between 
Christian  and  Moslem  tribes,  the  country  was  unable  to 
form  a  government  whose  authority  would  be  acknowl- 
edged by  all.  San  Giovanni  di  Medua,  the  port  of  Scutari, 
was  occupied  by  the  Montenegrins.  From  the  citadel  of 
Scutari  flew  the  flags  of  the  powers.    Less  than  a  year 

^  A  decision  was  rendered  by  the  commission,  and  Greece  agreed  to  accept  it. 
The  Epirotes,  however,  refused  to  become  Albanians.  There  was  an  uprising, 
marked  by  massacres,  which  showed  that  religious,  and  not  national,  feeling 
was  at  the  bottom  of  the  troubles,  and  in  1915  Greek  troops  returned  to  defend 
the  ' '  provisional  government ' '  against  Mohammedan  Albanians.  In  the  Bal- 
kan campaigns  of  the  World  War  Italy  managed  to  get  military  control  of 
the  disputed  region  and  agreed  to  withdraw  only  on  condition  that  northern 
Epirus  be  mostly  attributed  to  Albania.  This  action,  which  was  really  a  con- 
firmation of  the  commission  award  of  1914,  was  taken  in  the  autimin  of  1921. 


270         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

before  the  nations  of  Europe  were  at  one  another's  throats, 
the  powers  had  believed  they  could  avoid  the  war  by  an 
international  occupation  of  Scutari.  It  was  the  last  step 
in  the  series  of  concerted  actions  by  which  diplomacy  at- 
tempted to  save  the  peace  of  Europe.  There  was  little, 
however,  that  the  powers,  even  if  united,  could  do  for  a 
country  without  a  national  spirit  and  a  national  past.  The 
existence  of  nations  in  our  day  is  due  to  the  will  of  the 
people  rather  than  to  the  unifying  qualities  of  a  ruler.  If 
common  ideals  and  a  determination  to  attain  them  are  lack- 
ing, there  is  no  foundation  for  nationhood.  The  creation 
of  independent  Albania  by  the  ambassadors  of  the  powers 
at  London  was  regarded  by  them  as  a  necessity.  It  was 
none  the  less  a  makeshift.  Had  the  Albanians  done  their 
part  and  shown  the  desire  to  unite  and  to  take  upon  them- 
selves the  responsibilities  and  the  inhibitions  of  citizens  of 
a  country,  the  makeshift  might  have  developed  into  a  new 
European  state.  As  it  turned  out,  Albania  could  not  help 
being  a  fiasco. 

Among  the  many  candidates  put  forward  for  the  new 
throne,  Prince  William  of  Wied  was  finally  decided  upon. 
He  was  a  Protestant,  and  could  occupy  a  position  of  neu- 
trality among  his  Moslem,  Orthodox,  and  Catholic  subjects. 
He  was  a  German,  and  could  not  be  suspected  of  Slavic 
sympathies.  He  was  a  relative  of  the  King  of  Rumania, 
and  could  expect  powerful  support  in  the  councils  of  the 
Balkan  powers.  Prince  William  had  a  short  and  unhappy 
reign.  Lost  in  a  maze  of  bewildering  intrigues,  foreign  and 
domestic,  the  ruler  of  Albania  saw  his  prestige,  and  then 
his  dignity,  disappear.  He  never  enjoyed  any  real  au- 
thority. He  had  been  forced  upon  the  Albanians,  and  was 
soon  in  the  midst  of  insurrections.  Although  they  remained 
at  Scutari,  the  powers  did  nothing  to  support  Prince  Wil- 
liam or  to  prevent  the  lapse  into  anarchy  of  the  state  they 
had  called  into  being. 


THE  BALKAN  TANGLE   (1913-1914)  271 

The  outbreak  of  the  European  war  in  August,  1914,  en- 
abled the  powers  to  withdraw  gracefully  from  Albania. 
Their  contingents  hurriedly  abandoned  Scutari  and  sailed 
for  home.  The  French  did  not  have  time  to  do  this;  so 
they  went  to  Montenegro.  The  catastrophe,  which  they 
had  sought  to  prevent  by  creating  Albania,  had  fallen  upon 
Europe.  There  was  no  further  need  for  the  powers  to 
bother  about  the  fortunes  of  Prince  William  and  his  sub- 
jects. Italy  alone  was  left  with  hands  free.  But  as  long 
as  Greece  kept  out  of  the  war  Italian  interests  were  not  at 
stake.  Without  support  and  without  money,  there  was 
nothing  left  to  Prince  William  but  to  get  out.    And  he  did. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

THE  TEIPLE  ENTENTE  AGAINST   THE  CENTRAL  EMPIRES    (1914) 

WHEN  Austria-Hungary  annexed  the  Turkish  prov- 
inces of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  whose  adminis- 
tration had  been  intrusted  to  her  by  the  treaty  of  Berlin, 
the  German  ambassador  at  Petrograd  did  not  hesitate  to 
warn  Russia  that  Germany  stood  behind  the  Dual  Mon- 
archy. Three  years  later,  in  1911,  when  France  extended 
her  protectorate  over  Morocco,  the  British  ambassador  at 
Berlin  communicated  to  Germany  the  full  text  of  a  speech 
by  Mr.  Lloyd  George  in  which  it  was  affirmed  that  Great 
Britain  stood  behind  France.  In  neither  instance  was  there 
a  precise  statement  to  the  effect  that  the  warning  power 
intended  to  fight  to  defend  the  power  in  whose  behalf  the 
warning  was  issued.  But  it  was  easy  to  see  that  the  exi- 
gencies of  world  politics  were  bringing  together  into  oppos- 
ing groups  five  of  the  great  powers.  Austria-Hungary  and 
Russia  were  rivals  for  predominant  influence  in  the  Bal- 
kans. Germany  felt  that  she  could  not  afford  to  see  Russia 
attack  Austria-Hungary.  France  was  bound  to  come  to 
the  aid  of  Russia  in  case  Germany  intervened  in  an  Austro- 
Russian  war.  On  the  other  hand,  Germany,  poor  in  colo- 
nies and  late  in  beginning  to  exercise  political  and  economic 
influence  outside  Europe,  found  herself,  the  moment  her 
opposition  to  the  continued  aggrandizement  of  her  rivals 
began  to  count  for  something,  confronted  hj  the  Anglo- 
French  agreement  of  1904  and  the  Anglo-Russian  agree- 
ment of  1907. 

In  1908  Russia  was  not  prepared  to  push  her  champion- 
ship of  pan-Serbianism  to  the  point  of  starting  a  war  with 
Austria-Hungary  over  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  for  that 
would  have  involved  Germany  against  her.     In  1911  Ger- 

272 


TRIPLE  ENTENTE  VS.  CENTRAL  EMPIRES   (1914)     273 

many  was  unwilling  to  go  to  war  with  France  over  Morocco 
as  there  was  a  prospect  of  Great  Britain  aiding  France. 
One  of  Germany's  allies,  Austria-Hmigary,  did  not  have 
any  personal  interest  in  a  Germanic  solution  of  the  Moroc- 
can question,  while  Germany,  because  of  her  Drang  nach 
Osten,  did  have  a  powerful  reason  for  favoring  the  Austro- 
Hungarian  solution  of  the  question  of  Bosnia  and  Herze- 
govina. And  her  other  ally,  Italy,  was  bound  by  treaty 
not  to  oppose  the  extension  of  the  French  protectorate  over 
Morocco,  this  promise  having  been  obtained  by  France  in 
return  for  the  latter 's  acknowledgment  of  Italy's  right  to 
Tripoli.^  Neither  crisis  had  at  stake  enough  of  vital  im- 
portance for  any  of  the  powers  to  assume  the  responsibility 
of  precipitating  a  European  war. 

Between  1911  and  1914  Balkan  developments  had  become 
increasingly  alarming  for  Austria-Hungary.  Serbia,  vic- 
torious in  two  wars,  had  grown  amazingly  in  strength  and 
prestige.  A  pan-Serbian  secret  society,  the  Narodny 
Obrana,  was  carrying  on  an  active  separatist  propaganda, 
not  only  in  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  but  also  in  Dalmatia, 
Croatia,  and  Istria.  In  these  provinces  of  the  Dual  Mon- 
archy most  of  the  inhabitants  spoke  Serbian  and  belonged 
to  the  same  south  Slavic  stock  as  the  inhabitants  of  free 
Serbia.  Disliking  the  Austrians  and  hating  the  Hun- 
garians, who  had  long  been  ruling  them  as  a  subject  race, 
the  populations  of  these  regions  were  worked  upon  by  the 
propagandists  to  look  forward  to  the  creation  of  a  national 
life,  which  would  be  possible  only  by  the  union  of  all  the 
Serbian-speaking  peoples.  Owing  to  the  numbers  and  the 
geographical  position  of  the  south  Slavs,  it  was  evident 
that  the  success  of  the  Narodny  Obrana  would  mean  the 
disruption  of  the  Hapsburg  empire  and  the  interposition  of 
a  barrier  between  Austrians  and  Hungarians  and  the  sea. 

German  statesmen  and  German  public  opinion  believed 
that  the  maintenance  of  the  Hapsburg  empire,  with  an  out- 

1  See  pp.  234,  236. 


274         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

let  to  the  Mediterranean  at  Trieste  and  Fiume  and  a  foot- 
hold in  the  Balkan  peninsula  sufl5cient  for  the  protection  of 
its  tenure  on  the  Adriatic  coast,  was  vital  to  the  security 
and  prosperity  of  the  German  Empire.  France  and  Russia 
were  offensive  and  defensive  allies;  Great  Britain  pos- 
sessed the  supremacy  of  the  sea;  Italy  was  an  uncertain 
friend;  therefore  it  seemed  to  the  Germans  that  complete 
encirclement  could  be  avoided  only  by  the  preservation  of 
the  Dual  Monarchy.  It  was  an  economic  as  well  as  a  mili- 
tary necessity  for  Germany  that  the  Dual  Monarchy  con- 
tinue to  exist  without  diminution  of  territory.  Germany's 
lines  of  communication  with  the  Mediterranean  and  Con- 
stantinople passed  through  Vienna  and  Budapest.  The 
route  to  Turkey  was  becoming  as  important  for  the  Ger- 
mans as  the  route  to  India  had  long  been  for  the  British; 
and  the  Germans  had  made  up  their  minds  that  any  effort 
to  undermine  Austria-Hungary  would  have  to  be  checked, 
even  if  it  meant  war. 

On  June  25,  1914,  Kaiser  Wilhelm  II  inspected  the  Brit- 
ish fleet,  which  was  at  Kiel  for  the  celebration  of  the 
reopening  of  the  canal.  Three  days  later  the  Archduke 
Franz  Ferdinand  and  his  wife,  who  were  visiting  Serajevo, 
capital  of  Bosnia,  were  assassinated  by  a  member  of  the 
Narodny  Obrana.  The  Austro-Hungarian  government  de- 
cided to  take  measures  to  put  an  end  to  pan-Serbian  propa- 
ganda, using  the  assassination  of  the  heir  to  the  Hapsburg 
throne  as  the  occasion  and  justification  for  bringing  pres- 
sure to  bear  upon  Serbia  to  discountenance  the  nationalist 
agitation  in  the  Serbian-speaking  provinces  of  the  Dual 
Monarchy. 

It  was  recalled  that  the  Serbian  minister  at  Vienna  had 
made,  on  March  31,  1909,  the  following  formal  declaration 
to  the  Austro-Hungarian  ministry  of  foreign  affairs : 

''Serbia  declares  that  she  is  not  affected  in  her  rights  by 
the  situation  established  in  Bosnia,  and  that  she  will  there- 
fore adapt  herself  to  the  decisions  at  which  the  powers  are 


TRIPLE  ENTENTE  VS.  CENTRAL  EMPIRES  (1914)    275 

going  to  arrive  in  reference  to  article  25  of  the  treaty  of 
Berlin.  Following  the  advice  of  the  powers,  Serbia  binds 
herself  to  cease  the  attitude  of  protest  and  resistance  which 
she  has  assumed  since  last  October,  relative  to  the  annexa- 
tion, and  she  binds  herself  further  to  change  the  trend  of 
her  present  policy  towards  Austria-Hungary,  and,  in  the 
future,  to  live  with  the  latter  in  friendly  and  neighborly 
relations. ' ' 

The  press  and  public  opinion  in  Austria-Hungary,  dur- 
ing the  four  weeks  following  the  Serajevo  assassination, 
claimed  that  Serbia  had  broken  this  promise,  and  that  the 
unrest  in  Bosnia,  of  which  the  murder  of  the  archduke  was 
the  culmination,  was  due  to  the  instigation  of  the  officials 
of  the  Narodny  Obrana  and  to  secret  agents,  whose  head- 
quarters were  at  Belgrade  and  whose  activities  the  Serbian 
government  in  effect  encouraged  because  it  had  not  pre- 
vented them.  But  not  until  the  evening  of  July  23  did 
Europe  realize  that  Austria-Hungary,  with  Germany  be- 
hind her,  was  determined  to  impose  upon  Serbia  conditions 
that  Russia  would  not  tolerate. 

The  Austro-Hungarian  ultimatum  of  July  23  accused 
Serbia  of  having  failed  to  fulfil  the  promise  made  in  the 
declaration  of  March  31,  1909,  and  of  permitting  the  pan- 
Serbian  propaganda  to  be  disseminated  in  the  newspapers 
and  public  schools  of  the  kingdom.  The  assassination  of 
the  archduke  was  stated  to  be  the  direct  result  of  the 
Serbian  government's  violation  of  its  promise,  and  it  was 
claimed  that  proof  had  been  found  of  the  complicity  of  two 
Serbians,  one  an  army  officer  and  the  other  a  functionary 
who  belonged  to  the  Narodny  Obrana.  The  assassins,  it 
was  said,  had  received  their  arms  and  bombs  from  these 
two  men  and  had  been  knowingly  allowed  by  the  Serbian 
authorities  to  cross  the  Bosnian  frontier.  The  Austro- 
Hungarian  government  therefore  found  itself  compelled  to 
demand  of  the  Serbian  government  the  formal  condemna- 
tion of  the  propaganda  of  the  Narodny  Obrana,  which  was 
dangerous  to  the  existence  of  the  Dual  Monarchy,  because 


276  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

its  object  was  to  detach  from  Austria-Hungary  large  parts 
of  her  territory  and  to  attach  them  to  Serbia.  The  Serbian 
government  was  given  forty-eight  hours  in  which  to  agree 
to  disavow  the  pan-Serbian  nationalist  movement  and  to 
suppress  the  propagandists  in  Serbian  territory  by  taking 
drastic  measures,  which  were  outlined  in  detail  in  the 
ultimatum. 

Owing  to  pressure  from  Russia  and  France,  neither  of 
whom  was  prepared  for  war,  Serbia  accepted  in  principle 
the  terms  of  the  ultimatum,  and  promised,  if  her  reserva- 
tions to  certain  specific  demands  were  unsatisfactory,  to 
place  her  case  in  the  hands  of  the  Hague  tribunal.  This 
answer  was  taken  by  the  Serbian  premier  in  person  to  the 
Austro-Hungarian  minister  before  the  termination  of  the 
forty-eight  hours.  Without  referring  the  response  to  his 
government,  the  minister,  acting  on  jDrevious  instructions 
that  no  answer  other  than  an  unqualified  acceptance  in 
every  particular  of  the  ultimatum  would  be  admissible, 
replied  that  the  response  was  not  satisfactory  and  asked 
for  his  passports.  On  the  morning  of  July  28  Austria- 
Hungary  formally  declared  war,  and  the  same  evening 
the  bombardment  of  Belgrade  was  begun. 

Between  July  23  and  August  4  European  diplomacy 
exerted  itself  to  the  utmost  to  prevent  a  general  war.  Many 
volumes  have  been  written  giving  in  detail  the  story  of  the 
pourparlers  and  exchanges  of  despatches  among  the  chan- 
celleries during  the  fateful  ''twelve  days."  Naturally,  as 
the  participants  have  wanted  to  exculpate  themselves  and 
as  the  governments  have  sought  to  throw  the  responsibility 
for  the  war  upon  one  another,  it  is  impossible,  until  the 
archives  are  opened,  for  the  historian  to  judge  from  the 
evidence.^    Whatever  story  may  be  revealed  by  a  com- 

^  Most  of  the  German,  Austro-Hungarian,  and  Eussian  official  correspondence 
has  been  published,  because  of  the  complete  collapse  of  those  three  governments 
and  the  communication  of  their  archives  to  unauthorized  persons.  But  the 
French  and  British  governments  have  given  out  only  selected  documents  from 
their  archives,  which  are  in  the  nature  of  briefs  rather  than  of  evidence. 


TRIPLE  ENTENTE  VS.  CENTRAL  EMPIRES  (1914)    277 

plete  publication  of  the  diplomatic  correspondence  and 
conversations,  however,  the  student  who  approaches  the 
problem  of  the  responsibility  for  the  World  War  from  the 
point  of  view  of  world  politics  will  regard  the  ''twelve 
days"  as  of  minor  importance.  The  assassination  at 
Serajevo  furnished  an  occasion  for  the  outbreak  of  a  con- 
flict that  had  long  been  threatening  between  Austria-Hun- 
gary and  Eussia.  Both  of  these  powers  considered  that 
the  ascendancy  of  the  other  in  the  Balkans  meant  its  own 
political  disintegration  and  economic  stagnation.  And  the 
other  powers  were  committed  to  the  support  of  the  two 
potential  belligerents  by  a  long  chain  of  events  and  cir- 
cumstances that  had  to  do  primarily  with  their  overseas 
expansion. 

International  relations  are,  of  course,  affected  by  numer- 
ous considerations,  and  it  is  impossible  to  ignore  the  many 
trouble-breeding  causes  of  conflict  due  to  the  direct  rela- 
tions of  the  powers  as  neighbors  in  Europe.  But  it  may 
be  fairly  argued  that  none  of  these  sources  of  friction  in 
themselves  would  have  led  to  a  European  conflagration. 
During  the  century  preceding  the  war  of  1914  the  wars 
among  the  powders  were  limited  in  scope  and  objective. 
Both  the  commitments,  due  to  treaties  or  understandings, 
and  the  incentives  were  lacking  to  array  all  the  powers,  on 
opposing  sides,  in  a  quarrel  between  one  of  them  and  a 
small  state  or  between  two  of  them.  Even  as  late  as  1878, 
when  Great  Britain  compelled  Russia  to  bring  the  treaty 
of  San  Stefano  before  an  international  conference  for  revi- 
sion, there  was  no  danger  of  a  general  European  war. 
But  the  changes  that  had  occurred  between  1878  and  1914 
made  it  impossible  for  Austria-Hungary  to  attack  Serbia 
without  a  resultant  Armageddon. 

These  changes  can  be  summarized  under  two  heads: 
those  that  affected  the  international  position  of  each  power 
separately  and  led  to  the  alinement  of  1914  and  to  the  later 
intervention  of  other  states;  and  those  that  had  trans- 


278         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

formed  war  from  a  conflict  between  armed  forces  of  limited 
numbers  to  a  lif  e-and-death  struggle  between  peoples. 

When  Austria-Hungary  attacked  Serbia  she  mobilized 
against  Russia.  Russia's  counter-mobilization  to  defend 
Serbia  was  answered  by  the  general  mobilization  of  Ger- 
many, whose  armies  threatened  both  Russia  and  France. 
Because  France  refused  to  assure  Germany  that  she  would 
stand  by  and  allow  Russia  to  be  attacked  by  Germany, 
Germany  invaded  France  by  way  of  Belgium,  a  country 
whose  neutrality  she  was  bound  by  treaty  to  respect.  Great 
Britain  thereupon  declared  war  upon  Germany.  Between 
July  28  and  August  4  the  Austro-Serbian  hostilities  in- 
volved Russia,  France,  Great  Britain,  and  Belgium  in  a 
war  with  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary.  Montenegro 
entered  the  lists  in  defense  of  Serbia,  and  within  two 
months  Turkey  intervened  on  the  side  of  the  central  powers. 
In  the  meantime,  Japan  attacked  Germany  in  the  Far  East. 
In  1915  Italy  joined  the  entente  powers  and  Bulgaria  the 
central  powers.  In  1916  Portugal  and  Rumania  declared 
war  on  the  central  powers,  and  in  1917  the  intervention  of 
the  United  States,  Greece,  China,  Siam,  Liberia,  and  most 
of  the  Latin-American  republics  made  the  combination 
against  the  central  empires,  Turkey,  and  Bulgaria  vir- 
tually a  world  coalition. 

Of  the  reasons  for  the  entry  of  the  later  combatants 
we  shall  speak  elsewhere.^  The  principal  motives  that 
brought  in  the  belligerents  of  1914  were:  Austria-Hun- 
gary and  Russia — opposition  to  and  support  of  the  pan- 
Slavic  movement;  Germany — the  desire  to  maintain  con- 
trol of  the  route  to  the  Ottoman  Empire  and  to  break 
France  and  Russia  before  they  became  too  strong  for  her; 
France — national  security,  which  was  believed  to  be  de- 
pendent upon  the  preservation  of  a  strong  Russia;  Great 
Britain — the  determination  to  prevent  a  continental  power 
from  securing  the  hegemony  of  Europe  and  challenging 

^See  pp.  290-292,  294,  297,  301-304,  316-317,  361-363,  376-380. 


TRIPLE  ENTENTE  VS.  CENTRAL  EMPIRES  (1914)    279 

British  sea  power;  Japan — the  opportunity  of  eliminat- 
ing another  European  power  in  the  Far  East ;  Montenegro 
— the  knowledge  that  her  independence  would  disappear 
with  Serbia's;  Belgium  and  Serbia — resistance  to  aggres- 
sion, but,  coupled  with  it,  the  knowledge  that  if  a  war 
among  the  great  powers  resulted  in  the  triumph  of  the 
central  empires  Belgium  would  fall  under  German  and 
Serbia  under  Austro-Hungarian  domination;  and  Turkey 
— the  fear  of  losing  Constantinople  and  other  territory  if 
the  group  of  powers  including  Eussia  won  the  war. 

Immediately  after  the  war  had  begun,  however,  it  was 
necessary  for  statesmen  to  call  upon  their  peoples  to  fight 
for  ideals.  The  economic  reasons  and  political  combina- 
tions that  have  pitted  nations  against  one  another  are  ig- 
nored when  the  cataclysm  they  have  produced  arrives.  We 
must  be  careful  to  distinguish  between  the  underlying  mo- 
tives of  wars,  which  are  always  economic,  and  the  more 
noble  objects  men  have  before  their  eyes  when  they  are 
actually  fighting.  When  one's  country  is  invaded,  what- 
ever may  have  been  the  reason  for  the  invasion,  one  fights 
in  its  defense.  The  invading  armies  believe  that  if  they 
were  not  in  the  enemy's  country  the  enemy  would  be  in 
theirs.  Where  those  who  intervene  are  unable  to  invoke 
the  instinct  of  self-preservation,  they  are  spurred  to  sacri- 
fice by  the  thought  that  they  are  defending  the  weak  against 
''^he  strong  or  avenging  the  victims  of  the  enemy's  blood- 
lust.  When  we  think  how  unreservedly  the  peoples  of 
warring  nations  sacrifice  themselves,  we  realize  how  large 
a  part  idealism  plays  in  the  conduct  of  wars.  But  this  fact 
makes  only  the  more  important  the  critical  analj^sis  of  the 
forces  and  influences  that  make  inevitable  conflicts  among 
nations. 

When  we  examine  these  motives  we  see  that  they  have 
to  do  with  the  primal  instincts  that  are  the  causes  of  all 
wars — self-defense  and  self-aggrandizement;  and  that, 
when  they  are  called  into  play,  each  in  turn  is  precedent 


280         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  consequent.  Individually,  in  the  history  of  Europe, 
the  belligerents  had  heretofore  engaged  in  wars  with  each 
other,  and  sometimes  in  combinations.  But  the  influences 
that  had  provoked  duels  or  that  had  led  to  temporary  coali- 
tions were  primarily  European  in  character  and  had  to  do 
with  real  or  fancied  protection  of  interests  arising  from 
direct  relations  as  neighbors.  In  the  war  of  1914  both 
groups  of  belligerents  had  formed  their  alliances  because 
of  changes  in  their  relations  as  world  powers,  and  both 
were  tempted  to  engage  in  the  most  horrible  and  costly  of 
all  wars  through  a  concatenation  of  extra-European  events. 
The  European  nations  had  reached  a  stage  of  industrial 
evolution,  coupled  with  a  standard  of  living,  that  led  them 
to  believe  that  they  were  dependent  upon  maintaining  and 
increasing  their  world  markets.  Almost  insensibly  their 
relations  with  one  another  had  been  shaped  and  had  become 
fixed  by  considerations  of  world  politics. 

Propaganda  had  become  an  indispensable  agent  to  gov- 
ernments in  the  conduct  of  international  relations;  for 
along  with  universal  obligatory  military  service  and  in- 
creased taxes  to  pay  for  armaments  had  come  universal 
suffrage.  The  ultimate  control  of  foreign  policy,  there- 
fore, was  in  the  hands  of  those  who  contributed  financially 
and  who  might  at  any  time  be  called  upon  to  risk  their  lives. 
Yet  international  obligations  were  contracted  by  a  few  in 
the  name  of  the  people,  who  were  ignorant  of  the  details 
and  principles  of  the  policies  of  their  governments.  The 
object  of  propaganda  was  twofold :  to  make  the  people  be- 
lieve that  their  security  and  prosperity  depended  upon  an 
aggressive  foreign  policy,  which  defended  the  country's 
'interests"  throughout  the  world;  and  to  arouse  a  senti- 
ment of  suspicion  and  hatred  against  any  nation  that  might 
happen  to  become  a  colonial  and  commercial  competitor. 
Enemies  were  changed  to  friends  and  friends  to  enemies 
according  to  the  exigencies  of  world  politics.  The  im- 
perialists of  Germany  led  the  people  to  believe  that  Ger- 


TRIPLE  ENTENTE  VS.  CENTRAL  EMPIRES  (1914)    281 

many  was  disinherited  and  surrounded  by  enemies,  and 
that  backing  Austria-Hungary  was  the  only  way  of  salva- 
tion. In  Great  Britain,  on  the  other  hand,  the  people  were 
worked  upon  to  substitute  within  a  decade  Germany  for 
Eussia  and  France  as  the  formidable  potential  disturber  of 
world  peace. 

Between  France  and  Germany  there  was  undoubtedly  a 
feeling  of  animosity  that  could  be  traced  to  the  war  of 
1870.  The  annexation  of  Alsace-Lorraine  was  an  open 
wound,  and  the  Franco-Russian  alliance  made  Germany 
nervous  in  the  possession  of  her  plunder.  But  too  little 
importance  is  given  the  Moroccan  question  as  a  factor  in 
reviving  and  intensifying  the  hatred  between  the  two  coun- 
tries when  the  generation  that  had  fought  over  the  Rhine 
provinces  was  disappearing.  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that 
Austria  had  been  humiliated  and  robbed  by  Prussia  as 
much  as  France  had  been,  that  the  last  Austro-Prussian 
War  had  taken  place  only  four  years  before  the  Franco- 
Prussian  War,  and  that  France  had  been  thwarted  in  her 
ambitions  and  affronted  by  British  imperialism  three  times 
since  the  Franco-Prussian  War.  The  grouping  of  the 
powers  in  1914  can  not  be  explained  by  traditional  interests 
or  affinities  or  by  rancors,  but  simply  by  the  evolution  of 
world  policies. 

With  the  exception  of  Germany,  who  felt  that  the  mo- 
ment was  propitious,  none  of  the  powers  wanted  war  in 
the  sununer  of  1914.  Had  Germany  advised  restraint, 
Austria-Hungary  would  not  have  refused  to  accept  the 
Serbian  response  to  her  ultimatum.  Had  Germany  wanted 
to  avoid  the  risk  of  British  intervention,  she  would  not 
have  invaded  Belgium.  Germany  risked  the  test  of  the 
solidity  of  the  Franco-Russian  and  Anglo-Japanese  alli- 
ances and  of  the  genuineness  of  the  Anglo-French  Entente, 
She  was  willing,  also,  to  discount  any  weakness  in  her  ally's 
military  power  resulting  from  the  disaffection  of  subject 
Hapsburg  peoples.    The  uncertainty  of  Italy's  attitude 


282         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

did  not  seem  to  trouble  her.  She  went  into  the  war  with 
her  eyes  open,  confident  of  victory. 

But  the  initial  whirlwind  campaign  against  France  mis- 
carried because  of  the  stubborn  fighting  of  the  Belgians  and 
the  loss  of  the  first  battle  of  the  Marne.  During  the  fate- 
ful month  of  August,  while  invading  France,  Germany  was 
called  upon  to  make  a  tremendous  military  effort  to  stem 
the  Russian  invasion  of  east  Prussia.  The  hopes  of  a 
speedy  and  easy  victory  vanished  before  the  armies  had 
been  six  weeks  in  the  field.  On  both  fronts  the  Germans 
found  themselves  forced  to  dig  themselves  in,  and  to  face 
what  promised  to  be  a  long  and  exhausting  struggle. 

The  Entente  allies  were  able  to  oppose  a  solid  diplomatic 
front,  also,  to  Germany.  On  September  5, 1914,  Great  Brit- 
ain, France,  and  Russia  signed  an  agreement,  known  as 
the  ''pact  of  London,"  binding  themselves  not  to  conclude 
peace  separately  with  Germany;  and  to  this  agreement 
Japan  affixed  her  signature  on  October  19,  1915,  and  Italy 
on  December  1,  1915. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  THE  TRIPLE  ENTENTE  (1915) 

DURING  the  third  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century — • 
the  period  between  the  treaty  of  Paris  (1856)  and 
the  treaty  of  Berlin  (1878) — Prussia,  Austria,  and  Sar- 
dinia were  replaced  by  Germany,  Austria-Hungary,  and 
Italy  as  the  powers  of  central  Europe.  Both  Germans  and 
Italians  had  achieved  their  national  unity  at  the  expense 
of  the  Hapsburg  empire,  and  the  war  of  1866,  in  which 
they  were  allies  against  Austria,  was  an  essential  step  in 
their  unification.  But  economic  considerations  gradually 
led  to  an  alliance  with  Austria-Hungary,  which  was  con- 
cluded in  1882.  German  and  Italian  statesmen  continued 
for  more  than  a  generation  to  believe  that  the  Triple  Alli- 
ance was  advantageous  to  the  interests  of  their  countries, 
and  it  was  still  in  force  when  the  war  of  1914  broke  out. 

As  far  as  Italy  was  concerned,  the  vulnerable  points  in 
the  alliance  were:  (1)  Austria- Hungary  possessed  ''unre- 
deemed" portions  of  the  Italian  ''motherland";  (2)  Italy 
could  not  feel  safe  without  the  control  of  the  Adriatic  Sea, 
and  yet  this  was  Austria-Hungary's  only  outlet;  (3)  be- 
cause of  Great  Britain's  control  of  the  Mediterranean  Sea, 
it  was  impossible  for  Italy  to  be  relied  upon  to  participate 
in  any  war  without  the  consent  of  the  British;  (4)  in  the 
competition  for  overseas  markets,  Italy's  allies  were  not 
in  a  position  to  bargain  with  her  and  offer  her  "compen- 
sations," as  were  the  other  powers;  and  (5)  Germany  had 
no  common  frontier  with  Italy.  Had  any  one  of  these 
weak  points  in  the  alliance  been  lacking,  the  central  em- 
pires might  have  been  able  to  prevent  the  orientation  of 
Italy  towards  their  enemies  and  the  intervention  of  Italy 

283 


284  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

against  them.  But  taken  together  they  proved  too  great 
a  handicap  for  German  diplomacy  to  overcome  when  Italy 
was  faced  with  the  alternatives  of  neutrality  or  participa- 
tion in  the  World  War. 

Irredentism  is  a  term  originally  used  to  denote  the  doc- 
trine of  the  agitators  for  Italian  unification,  who  taught 
that  the  people  of  the  Italian  peninsula  would  achieve  their 
goal  of  becoming  a  nation  only  when  those  who  spoke  Ital- 
ian were  united  under  one  government.  It  was  the  Latin 
version  of  the  old  saying  that  ''where  there  are  Hellenes, 
there  is  Hellas,"  and  it  was  soon  developed  far  beyond  just 
ethnological  claims.  AVhere  the  irredentists  were  con- 
fronted with  alien  majorities  in  coveted  territories,  his- 
torical claims  and  the  argument  of  strategic  necessity  were 
advanced. 

There  were  terre  irredente  (unredeemed  lands)  on  the 
other  side  of  virtually  every  frontier  in  Europe ;  and,  while 
force  still  remained  the  supreme  argument  in  establishing 
a  boundary,  the  aggressive  intentions  of  the  powers  to 
despoil  one  another  were  usually  disguised  by  the  idealism 
of  irredentism.  Encouragement  of  separatist  movements 
in  neighboring  countries  was  carried  on  in  time  of  peace ; 
irredentism  was  a  powerful  instrument  in  the  hands  of 
statesmen  not  only  to  bring  pressure  to  bear  in  diplo- 
matic negotiations,  but  also  to  foster  and  intensify  the 
war  spirit  among  the  common  people;  and,  after  wars, 
annexation  of  territories  of  the  vanquished  state  was  al- 
ways justified  by  the  plea  of  ''redeeming  enslaved  brothers 
of  blood,"  taking  back  provinces  that  had  formerly  be- 
longed to  the  victors,  or  establishing  historic  or  strategic 
frontiers. 

Although  the  irredentist  ideal  was  in  many  cases  a 
reasonable  and  legitimate  ambition,  to  statesmen  it  be- 
came a  cloak  for  concealing  the  real  objects  of  diplo- 
macy— economic  advantages  and  mihtaiy  guaranties. 
Irredentism  was  a  good  weapon  of  attack.     But  it  became 


ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  TRIPLE  ENTENTE   (1915)    285 

inextricably  involved  with  the  aspirations  of  nationalism 
and  the  obligations  of  patriotism,  and  therefore  was  Hkely 
to  get  beyond  the  control  of  those  who  wanted  to  use  it  in 
moderation.  This  happened  in  Italy,  where  a  generation 
of  premiers  and  ministers  of  foreign  affairs  had  kept  in 
check  the  irredentist  demands  of  the  Italian  nationalists. 

Italy's  terre  irredente  were  Nice,  Savoy,  Corsica,  and 
Tunisia,  held  by  France;  Malta,  held  by  Great  Britain; 
three  cantons  of  Switzerland;  the  southern  half  of  the 
Austrian  Tyrol;  and  all  the  parts  of  the  Adriatic  littoral 
held  by  Austria,  Hungary,  Montenegro,  and  Albania.  The 
more  radical  irredentists  recalled  that  medieval  Italy  had 
enjoyed  a  privileged  position  in  the  commerce  of  the  east- 
ern Mediterranean.  The  Italian  city-states  ruled  in  the 
islands  and  the  ports  of  the  ^gean  Sea,  and  there  were 
self-governing  colonies  in  Constantinople  and  other  ports 
of  the  Byzantine  Empire.  It  was  contended  that  the  pros- 
perity and  security  of  the  people  inhabiting  the  Italian 
peninsula  depended  as  much  in  the  twentieth  century  as  in 
the  days  of  imperial  Rome  and  the  medieval  repubhcs 
upon  an  overlordship  in  all  Mediterranean  lands  east  of 
Sicily. 

The  application  of  irredentist  principles  to  Switzerland 
was  never  seriously  considered.  The  Italians,  more  than 
the  French  and  Germans,  have  profited  by  the  neutraliza- 
tion of  the  Alpine  regions  that  otherwise  would  have  been 
a  troublesome  common  frontier.  Savoy  was  a  mountain- 
ous hinterland  that  prevented  Nice,  in  the  hands  of  France, 
from  becoming  a  competitor  of  Genoa  and  Venice  for  the 
trade  of  central  Europe.  The  western  and  northern  fron- 
tiers of  Italy  with  France  and  Switzerland  were  strategi- 
cally excellent,  and  what  lay  beyond  them  was  not  economi- 
cally tempting.  The  frontier  of  1866  with  Austria,  on  the 
other  hand,  gave  all  the  mountain  fortresses  to  a  potential 
enemy;  Trieste  and  Fiume  were  powerful  rivals  of  Genoa 
and  Venice;  Austria-Hungary  had  a  naval  base  on  the 


286  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Istrian  peninsula,  which  dominated  Venice ;  and  the  Italian 
coast  of  the  Adriatic  was  exposed  and  without  ports,  while 
the  Dalmatian  coast  opposite  was  protected  by  numerous 
islands  and  had  several  splendid  ports. 

There  were  ''brothers  of  blood"  beyond  all  the  fron- 
tiers: Nice  and  Savoy  had  been  Italian  up  to  within  fifty 
years ;  Trieste  and  most  of  the  unredeemed  regions  on  the 
Austrian  side  had  belonged  to  the  Hapsburg  crown  since 
the  fourteenth  century.  Irredentist  propaganda  is  invari- 
ably based  on  ethnology  and  history.  But  behind  the  racial 
and  historical  claims  lurk  powerful  economic  and  strategic 
interests.  To  redeem  their  Italian-speaking  brethren  from 
the  yoke  of  the  foreigner  and  to  unite  them  with  the 
motherland  were  undoubtedly  the  motives  that  actuated  the 
mob  spirit  in  Italy  in  the  spring  of  1915.  But  the  propa- 
ganda that  brought  about  this  result  became  an  irresistible 
national  sentiment  because  Italian  merchants  and  shippers 
wanted  a  monopoly  of  the  Mediterranean  trade  of  central 
Europe,  and  because  Italian  military  and  naval  experts 
believed  that  the  safety  of  their  country  demanded  a  new 
mountain  frontier  on  the  northeast  and  the  exclusion  from 
the  Adriatic  of  all  naval  powers  other  than  Italy. 

Tunisia  was  by  far  the  most  important  booty  Italy  could 
hope  to  take  from  France  by  war ;  and  had  the  French  and 
British  fought  in  1898  over  conflicting  ambitions  in  Africa, 
instead  of  adjusting  their  differences  by  a  series  of  agree- 
ments, Italy  would  have  been  tempted  to  declare  war  on 
France  to  seize  the  coveted  African  province.  Aggrand- 
izement in  Africa  entered  largely  into  the  calculations  of 
Italian  foreign  policy  at  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century. 
But  the  Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904  definitely  de- 
stroyed any  hopes  Italy  might  have  had  of  using  a  war 
between  Great  Britain  and  France  to  take  Tunisia  from 
the  latter.  Italy  was  not  forgotten  during  the  secret  nego- 
tiations leading  up  to  that  agreement,  and  her  acceptance 
of  it  as  a  Mediterranean  adjustment  had  already  been  pur- 


ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  TRIPLE  ENTENTE  (1915)    287 

chased  by  the  acknowledgment  of  her  eventual  rights  to 
Tripoli. 

The  naval  supremacy  of  Great  Britain  makes  it  impos- 
sible for  any  peninsular  state  to  go  into  a  war  on  the  side 
of  Britain's  enemies.  Among  peninsular  states  Italy  is 
peculiarly  at  the  mercy  of  the  mistress  of  the  seas.  The 
change  in  the  attitude  of  Great  Britain  towards  France  and 
Germany  between  1899  and  1914  necessitated  a  strictly 
defensive  interpretation  of  the  Triple  Alliance  on  the  part 
of  Italy.  Germany  realized  this  and  did  not  count  on 
Italian  support.  No  credit  is  due  to  Italy  for  relieving 
France  of  the  handicap  of  having  to  keep  an  army  on  the 
Italian  frontier  at  the  beginning  of  the  war.  It  would  have 
been  madness  for  Italy  to  follow  a  poUcy  of  uncertain  neu- 
trality. She  would  have  suffered  Avhat  Greece  suffered 
later.  Had  there  been  no  other  impelling  force  than  that 
of  British  sea  power,  it  is  probable  that  Italy  would  have 
found  it  prudent  to  join  the  Entente  powers. 

The  sober  judgment  of  conservative  and  clerical,  as  well 
as  of  advanced  radical,  leaders  was  that  Italy's  wisest 
course  would  be  to  maintain  her  neutrality.  Italy  was 
poor,  and  had  the  opportunity  to  become  rich.  If  the  cen- 
tral empires  won,  she  would  certainly  receive  Tunisia  and 
Djibouti  and  probably  more,  as  a  reward  for  having  re- 
sisted the  Entente  propaganda.  If  the  central  empires 
were  defeated,  it  would  be  to  the  interest  of  the  victors  to 
weaken  Austria  by  allowing  Italy  to  annex  the  Trentino 
(southern  Austrian  Tyrol)  and  Trieste.  If  both  sides 
fought  to  exhaustion,  Italy  would  be  the  arbiter  of  Europe, 
and  could  have  pretty  much  all  she  wanted  from  both  sides. 
In  answer  to  the  argument  of  the  interventionists  that,  if 
the  central  empires  won,  Italy  would  have  to  give  up  her 
hope  of  incorporating  the  Trentino  and  Trieste,  the  non- 
interventionists  called  attention  to  the  peril  of  Slavic  pene- 
tration to  the  Adriatic  that  would  follow  an  Entente  victory. 

During  the  first  winter  of  the  war  the  irredentists  in- 


288         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

duced  public  opinion  to  clamor  for  intervention  by  preach- 
ing, what  was  undoubtedly  true,  that  Austria  was  the 
hereditary  enemy,  and  that  the  full  achievement  of  Itahan 
unity  was  possible  only  through  the  destruction  of  the 
Hapsburg  empire.  When  the  old  cry  of  the  Risorgimento 
was  raised,  all  other  considerations  were  disregarded.^ 
Italians  must  be  liberated  from  the  Austrian  yoke,  and  the 
Adriatic  must  become  an  Italian  sea. 

When  Italian  statesmen  realized  the  strength  of  the 
interventionist  propaganda,  they  appealed  to  Germany  to 
influence  Austria  to  give  up  enough  of  the  disputed  border 
districts  to  satisfy  the  irredentist  clamor.  But  at  the  same 
time,  knowing  that  they  might  have  to  yield  to  the  war 
party,  they  entered  into  negotiations  with  the  Entente 
powers  to  arrange  as  good  a  bargain  as  possible  for  their 
intervention.  It  is  not  correct  to  say  that  the  Italian  gov- 
ernment was  offering  Italy's  sword  to  the  highest  bidder. 
On  the  one  hand,  it  was  impossible  that  Italy  should  con- 
sent to  fight  with  her  allies ;  on  the  other,  the  men  in  power 
differed  from  the  opposition  only  in  degree  of  willingness 
to  withstand  the  interventionist  pressure  and  carried  on 
the  negotiations  with  the  entente  governments  to  protect 
Italy's  interests  in  case  public  opinion  forced  the  issue. 
The  anti-interventionists,  under  the  leadership  of  men  like 
Signor  Giolitti,  were  not  pro-German.  It  happened  that 
the  policy  of  strict  neutrality  that  they  advocated  favored 
Germany,  as  its  success  would  have  meant  the  loss  to  the 
Entente  of  Itahan  aid ;  but  this  policy  was  conceived  wholly 
in  the  interest  of  Italy.  Why  should  a  safe  and  profitable 
neutrality  be  abandoned  for  a  belligerency  whose  conven- 
iences and  possible  gains  were  offset  by  inconveniences  and 
possible  losses'? 

^  After  the  downfall  of  Napoleon,  the  treaty  of  Vienna  gave  Venetia  and 
Lombardy  to  the  Hapsburgs  and  restored  to  their  thrones  the  Hapsburg 
princes  of  central  Italy.  The  movement  for  unification,  called  the  Eisorgi- 
mento,  adopted  the  old  Ghibelline  motto,  " Fuori  i  tedescM!"  ("Out  with 
the  Germans!  ") 


ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  TRIPLE  ENTENTE  (1915)    289 

Prince  von  Biilow  worked  indef  atigably  at  Rome  to  coun- 
teract the  entente  propaganda  which,  although  frowned 
upon  in  court  and  church  circles  and  actively  opposed  by 
the  bankers,  steadily  gained  ground  during  the  first  winter 
of  the  war.  The  rock  upon  which  the  prince's  efforts 
finally  split  was  the  unwillingness  of  Austria  to  abandon 
any  considerable  amount  of  territory  to  Italy  as  the  price 
of  continued  neutrality.  On  April  8,  1915,  the  Italian  gov- 
ernment formulated  its  program  of  concessions  that  might 
satisfy  the  irredentists.  An  unsatisfactory  answer  from 
Austria  on  April  25  led  to  the  denunciation  of  the  Triple 
Alliance  on  May  3.  Italy  addressed  a  note  to  Austria  stat- 
ing that  the  ultimatum  to  Serbia  and  the  subsequent  Aus- 
trian acts  which  had  brought  on  the  World  War  had  been 
undertaken  without  the  knowledge  or  consent  of  Italy,  had 
been  contrary  to  the  spirit  and  letter  of  the  treaty  of  alli- 
ance, had  involved  Austria  in  responsibilities  that  Italy 
could  not  share,  and  that  therefore  the  Triple  Alliance  had 
lost  its  value  and  was  terminated.  A  fortnight  of  fruitless 
negotiations  followed.  On  May  20  Austria  offered  recti- 
fications of  frontier  in  the  Tyrol  and  in  Venetia ;  the  procla- 
mation of  Trieste  as  a  free  imperial  city  with  an  Italian 
university;  recognition  of  Italian  sovereignty  over  Valona 
and  avowal  of  Austria 's  disinterestedness  in  Albania ;  and 
an  amnesty  to  subjects  of  the  empire  convicted  for  irre- 
dentist activities. 

Had  the  negotiations  been  allowed  to  continue,  Austria 
would  probably  have  ended  by  accepting  Italy 's  conditions. 
But  the  demonstrations  in  favor  of  war  throughout  the 
country  had  become  too  threatening  to  be  ignored.  Italy 
mobilized  on  May  22,  and  the  next  day  declared  war  on 
Austria.  War  was  declared  on  Turkey  on  August  20.  A 
whole  year  passed,  however,  before  the  Italian  government 
realized  that  it  was  necessary  to  have  Germany  also  as  an 
enemy.  Only  when  Germany  sent  troops  to  aid  Austria  on 
the  Italian  front  did  Italy,  on  August  28,  1916,  become 


290         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

formally  an  enemy  of  her  old  ally.  The  Italians  kept  as- 
serting that  they  had  no  quarrel  with  the  Germans,  and 
appeared  grieved  and  incensed  when  they  discovered  that 
Germany  had  determined  to  aid  Austria  against  them.^ 

The  Entente  military  authorities  counted  upon  the  Itahan 
intervention  to  render  impossible  a  counter-offensive  of  the 
central  empires  against  Russia,  which  was  a  movement 
that  they  anticipated  and  dreaded.  The  Entente  statesmen 
looked  upon  the  entry  of  Italy  into  the  alliance  as  one  more 
link  in  the  chain  of  enemies  with  which  they  were  planning 
to  encircle  the  central  empires,  and  they  attached  much  im- 
portance to  ' '  the  moral  effect ' '  of  Italian  intervention  upon 
enemies  and  neutrals.  In  particular,  they  were  confident 
that  it  would  result  in  Rumania's  adhesion.  Entente  finan- 
cial and  big  business  interests,  which  played  a  dominant 
role  in  the  diplomacy  of  the  war,  regarded  the  damage  to 
German  banks  and  commercial  houses  by  the  defection  of 
Italy  as  an  advantage  worth  the  high  price  Italian  states- 
men asked. 

On  April  26,  1915,  more  than  a  week  before  she  de- 
nounced the  Triple  Alliance,  Italy  had  buttered  her  bread 
on  the  other  side  by  concluding  at  London  a  secret  treaty 
with  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Russia.  Until  the  soviet 
government  published  the  archives  of  the  Russian  ministry 
of  foreign  affairs  three  years  later,  the  terms  of  the  treaty 
of  London  were  not  definitely  known.  Their  disclosure, 
however,  did  not  come  as  a  shock,  for  the  ambitions  of  Italy 
had  long  been  a  matter  of  public  record.     Italy  was  prom- 

^  A  strong  and  prosperous  Germany  is  an  essential  part  of  Italian  foreign 
policy,  for  Germany  is  the  key  to  the  economic  well-being  of  central  Europe, 
on  which  Italy  is  largely  dependent.  While  many  Italians  during  the  war 
declared  that  Italy  needed  to  cast  off  the  yoke  of  Germany  in  business,  which 
was  fettering  Italy,  they  were  equally  positive  in  announcing  their  intention 
not  to  let  Great  Britain  and  Franae  take  Germany's  place  in  Italian  financial 
and  commercial  life.  The  Italians  want  to  be  friends  with  all  Europe.  In 
order  not  to  give  offense  to  the  Germany  of  the  future,  the  Italian  govern- 
ment has  decided  to  celebrate  November  3  instead  of  November  11  as  armistice 
day,  and  the  lower  part  of  the  Via  Nasionale,  the  principal  street  of  Rome,  has 
been  changed  to  Via  Tre  Novemire  to  emphasize  the  fact  that  Italy's  victory 
was  over  Austria-Hungary. 


ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  TRIPLE  ENTENTE   (1915)    291 

ised  not  only  the  Trentino  and  the  extension  of  her  eastern 
frontier  to  include  Trieste,  where  the  population  was 
largely  Italian,  but  also  the  purely  German  Tyrolese  dis- 
tricts south  of  the  Brenner  Pass;  the  peninsula  of  Istria 
with  a  generous  hinterland ;  the  northern  half  of  Dahnatia, 
and  almost  all  the  islands  off  the  Dalmatian  coast,  where 
the  Italian  population  was  negligible ;  Valona,  the  principal 
port  of  Albania,  and  its  neighborhood;  the  twelve  islands 
of  the  Dodecannese,  whose  population  was  Greek;  and  a 
portion  of  Asia  Minor.  If  the  French  and  British  in- 
creased their  colonial  holdings  in  Africa  at  the  expense  of 
Germany,  Italy  was  to  receive  adequate  territorial  com- 
pensation. 

The  secret  treaty  of  London  marked  the  abandonment, 
before  the  end  of  the  first  year  of  the  war,  of  the  generous 
idealism  that  had  seemed  to  make  the  conflict  one  of  prin- 
ciples rather  than  of  imperialistic  aims.  Although  the 
people  of  the  Entente  countries  sincerely  believed  that  they 
were  fighting  for  small  nations  and  for  a  durable  world 
peace,  their  governments  negotiated  with  one  another  for 
political  and  commercial  advantages  throughout  the  world, 
and  concluded  a  series  of  secret  agreements  (of  which  the 
treaty  of  London  was  only  the  first)  that  were  wholly  in- 
consistent with  their  pledges  to  their  own  peoples  and  to 
the  world.  In  event  of  victory,  the  Entente  powers  were 
bound  to  support  one  another  in  preying  upon  small  na- 
tions in  the  same  manner  as  the  central  powers  were  being 
pilloried  before  the  world  for  doing.  The  treaties  signed 
at  Paris  in  1919  and  1920,  as  far  as  most  of  their  territorial 
clauses  are  concerned,  simply  fulfilled  bargains  made  dur- 
ing the  war. 

Because  the  Jugo-Slavs  and  Greeks  suspected  the  du- 
plicity of  the  Entente  statesmen,  the  intervention  of  Italy 
did  not  make  any  appreciable  difference  in  the  general 
mihtary  and  political  situation.  In  Greece,  King  Con- 
stantine  was  given  a  new  and  powerful  argument  to  use 


292         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

against  the  Venizelist  campaign  for  intervention.  There 
was  a  very  widespread  feeling  among  the  Greeks  that  they 
had  been  double-crossed,  and  this  feeling  never  changed, 
despite  the  later  return  to  power  of  Venizelos  and  the  par- 
ticipation of  Greece  in  the  war.  Rumania  did  not  imme- 
diately join  the  Entente,  as  had  been  expected.  Even  her 
interventionist  statesmen  realized  that  Rumania,  too,  in 
order  to  safeguard  against  being  sold  out,  must  have  a 
definite  secret  treaty  on  the  Italian  model  before  abandon- 
ing neutrality.  Instead  of  hastening  the  process  of  dis- 
integration in  the  Hapsburg  empire,  the  intervention  of 
Italy  gave  the  Dual  Monarchy  a  new  lease  of  life.  The 
Jugo-Slavs  had  been  soldiers  of  uncertain  loyalty  on  the 
eastern  front,  and,  with  the  Czechs,  were  demoralizing  the 
army.  After  Italy  came  into  the  war  they  fought  like  lions 
on  the  new  front,  inspired  by  the  knowledge  that  victorious 
Italy  would  suppress  their  national  aspirations  more  ruth- 
lessly than  Austria  had  ever  done. 

We  have  seen  how  the  Triple  Entente  was  the  result  of 
the  influence  of  world  poUcies  which  modified  and  then 
reversed  the  attitude  of  the  three  powers  towards  one  an- 
other. The  Entente  now  became  a  quadruple  grouping, 
mainly  because  of  the  irredentist  movement,  which  forced 
the  hand  of  the  Italian  government.  But,  as  we  have  seen, 
Italy's  partnership  with  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary 
had  lost  its  significance  from  the  moment  Great  Britain, 
with  whom  Italy  had  to  remain  on  friendly  terms,  formed 
an  entente  with  France,  Germany's  enemy.  World  poli- 
cies brought  about  the  defection  of  Italy  from  the  Triple 
Alliance,  for  it  is  doubtful  if  the  irredentists  alone  could 
have  forced  the  war.  Italian  imperialism  saw  in  the  vic- 
tory of  the  Entente  the  only  hope  of  further  colonial  ex- 
pansion. Germany  might  win  the  war,  as  far  as  European 
hegemony  was  at  stake.  But  Germany 's  victory,  from  the 
trend  of  her  pre-war  policy  as  well  as  because  of  her  alli- 
ance with  Turkey,  would  shut  off  Italy  from  expansion  in 


ITALY'S  ENTRANCE  INTO  TRIPLE  ENTENTE  (1915)    293 

the  eastern  Mediterranean.  And  in  Africa  France  and 
Great  Britain  were  in  a  better  position  to  offer  Italy  colo- 
nial compensations  than  was  Germany. 

Italy  entered  the  war  without  foreseeing  the  sacrifices 
she  would  be  called  upon  to  make.  She  greatly  underesti- 
mated the  military  genius  and  vitality  of  Germany,  and 
never  supposed  that  her  troops  would  be  fighting  a  defen- 
sive war  on  her  o^\^l  soil.  Consequently,  wiien  Italian 
statesmen  later  took  into  consideration  what  the  war  had 
cost  the  nation,  they  boldly  argued  that  even  the  rewards 
guaranteed  by  the  treaty  of  London  were  insufficient. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THE  ALINEMENT  OF  THE  BALKAN  STATES  IN  THE 
EUROPEAN  WAE    (1914-1917) 

SERBIA  was  the  only  Balkan  state  involved  in  the  Euro- 
pean war  from  the  beginning.  To  show  her  solidarity, 
however,  Montenegro  declared  war  upon  Austria-Hungary 
on  August  7,  1914.  The  other  factors  in  the  Balkan  situa- 
tion, Turkey,  Greece,  Bulgaria,  and  Rumania,  contained 
influential  partizans  of  both  groups  of  the  great  powers, 
and  an  internal  struggle  immediately  took  place,  which 
did  not  cease  until  all  four  of  these  states  had  become 
belligerents.  Because  of  the  wars  through  which  they  had 
just  passed  the  Balkan  peoples  were  not  keen  to  enter  upon 
new  military  adventures.  The  consensus  of  public  opinion 
undoubtedly  favored  the  maintenance  of  neutrality,  and, 
as  the  great  powers  seemed  to  be  evenly  balanced,  there 
was  little  to  be  gained  by  extending  the  war  to  the  Balkans 
and  Asia  unless  the  Balkan  States  were  ready  to  intervene 
together  on  the  same  side.  During  the  first  two  months 
of  the  war  the  statesmen  of  the  great  powers  made  no 
strong  bid  for  Balkan  alliances  or  *' benevolent "  neutral- 
ities. They  believed  that  any  aid  a  Balkan  recruit  could 
bring  them  would  be  more  than  offset  by  the  responsibili- 
ties they  would  have  to  assume  of  defending  the  new  ally 
from  an  attack  by  its  neighbors. 

When,  however,  at  the  end  of  September,  Turkey  joined 
the  central  powers,  the  attitude  of  the  belligerent  group 
towards  the  Balkan  States  underwent  a  change.  It  was 
now  essential  to  the  Entente  powers  that  Germany  and 
Austria-Hungary  should  have  no  opportunity  of  extending 
their  front  through  the  Balkans  to  Constantinople.     They 

294 


BALKAN  STATES  IN  EUROPEAN  WAR  (1914-1917)    295 

decided  to  concentrate  upon  Turkey  and  put  her  liors  du 
combat  while  she  remained  isolated  from  her  allies.  For 
this  purpose  the  continued  neutrality  of  the  Balkan  States 
was  more  advantageous  than  an  alliance  with  one  or  more 
which  would  provoke  another  to  join  the  Entente 's  enemies. 
This  policy  required  delicate  and  complicated  diplomatic 
manoeuvering.  Although  it  eventually  failed,  it  was  worth 
trying,  and  it  would  have  shortened  the  war  had  the  British 
and  French  fleets  and  their  expeditionary  corps  succeeded 
in  forcing  the  Dardanelles  in  the  spring  and  summer  of 
1915.  But  the  heritage  of  evil  in  the  Balkans,  due  to  more 
than  half  a  century  of  selfish  diplomacy,  had  to  be  reckoned 
with.  It  frustrated  every  move  and  every  suggested  com- 
bination, and  was  in  large  part  responsible  for  the  pro- 
longation of  the  war  until  the  Eomanoff  as  well  as  the 
Hapsburg  empire  collapsed,  and  until  economic  and  politi- 
cal problems  of  an  almost  insoluble  character  arose  to  rob 
the  ultimate  victors  of  the  fruits  of  victory. 

In  the  minds  of  Occidentals  the  war  of  1914  was  pri- 
marily a  struggle  of  France  and  Great  Britain  against 
Germany,  and  from  the  beginning  its  idealism  was  empha- 
sized. It  was  a  war  of  democracy  against  autocracy,  of 
the  defenders  of  small  nations  against  their  oppressors. 
Germany  was  a  military  despotism  aiming  at  the  conquest 
of  the  world,  and  Austria-Hungary  was  a  government  of 
two  minority  races  oppressing — by  dividing  them — a  non- 
Teutonic  and  non-Magyar  majority.  Serbia  was  the  vic- 
tim of  Austria-Hungary  and  Belgium  the  victim  of  Ger- 
many. From  our  point  of  view  this  conception  of  the  war 
appeared  true  and  reasonable.  But  the  Balkan  peoples 
could  not  see  it  in  the  same  light.  To  them  Russia  was 
the  principal  power  affected  by  the  war,  and  their  experi- 
ence with  Russian  political  ideals  prevented  them  from 
becoming  enthusiastic  over  French  and  British  champion- 
ship of  democracy  and  small  nations.  Fear  of  Russia 
drove  the  Turks  into  the  arms  of  the  Germans,  and  while 


296         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  AVORLD  POLITICS 

none  of  the  Balkan  nations  sympathized  with  Turkey,  all 
of  them  preferred  weak  Turkey  to  powerful  Russia  as 
master  of  Constantinople  and  the  Straits.  To  Eumania 
and  Bulgaria  and  Greece  the  extension  of  the  Muscovite 
empire  to  the  Bosphorus  and  Dardanelles  was  a  possibility 
that  they  were  not  fools  enough  to  make,  by  their  aid,  a 
probability.  In  Paris  and  London  much  was  said  about 
the  Rumanians  under  the  yoke  of  Hungary.  But  in  Bu- 
kharest  they  thought  also  of  the  Rumanians  under  the  yoke 
of  Russia.  The  dream  of  a  greater  Rumania  demanded 
the  restoration  of  Bessarabia  by  Russia  as  well  as  the  ces- 
sion of  Transylvania  by  Hungary. 

The  secret  treaty  by  which  the  Entente  powers  definitely 
promised  Constantinople  to  Russia  was  not  signed  until 
1915.  But  in  every  Balkan  capital  it  was  realized  from 
the  outbreak  of  the  war  that  victorious  Russia  would  not 
accept  any  reward  less  than  Constantinople  and  the  Straits. 
This  fact,  quite  as  much  as  war  weariness  or  lack  of  con- 
fidence in  the  military  superiority  of  the  enemies  of  Ger- 
many, explains  the  unwillingness  of  any  Balkan  state  to 
cast  in  its  lot  unreservedly  on  the  side  of  the  Entente 
powers.  And  the  inability  of  French  and  British  states- 
men to  promise  the  Balkan  States  that  Russia  should  not 
have  Constantinople  was  a  consideration  of  equal  import- 
ance with  the  opposition  of  the  Entente  military  authorities 
to  the  assumption  of  new  responsibilities  in  determining, 
during  the  first  year  of  the  war,  the  policy  of  not  soliciting 
(and  even  rebuffing  offers  of)  Balkan  aid. 

The  French  and  British  also  wanted  to  keep  the  Balkan 
States  out  of  the  war  because  they  were  fishing  for  bigger 
game.  The  aspirations  of  Italy  were  in  conflict  with  the 
legitimate  interests  and  hopes  of  both  Serbia  and  Greece. 
Serbia  was  already  involved  in  the  war,  and  could  make 
no  effective  protest  when  bribes  were  offered  Italy.  Eut 
negotiations  with  Greece  would  have  proved  embarrassing 
because  what   Greece  would  have  asked  for — the  Dode- 


BALKAN  STATES  IN  EUROPEAN  WAR  (1914-1917)    297 

cannese,  Smyrna,  and  northern  Epirus — the  negotiators  at 
Rome  were  preparing  to  give  to  Italy.  When  Italy  entered 
the  war  in  May,  1915,  France  and  Great  Britain  were  com- 
mitted to  the  support  of  Italian  imperialism  as  they  were 
already  committed  to  the  support  of  Russian  imperialism. 
This  meant  that  the  ideals  of  defending  democracy  and 
small  nations  were  not  to  be  applied  in  the  Balkans,  and 
the  Balkan  peoples  knew  it. 

In  the  summer  of  1915  three  events  brought  about  a 
change  in  the  attitude  of  the  Entente  powers  towards  Bal- 
kan neutrality.  The  naval  and  military  operations  at  thv. 
Dardanelles  failed.  The  Russian  offensive  against  Ger. 
many  broke  down  all  along  the  line.  The  central  empires 
conquered  Poland.  Armies  were  free  to  begin  on  a  large 
scale  the  invasion  of  Serbia.  The  intervention  of  Greece, 
which  had  twice  been  offered  to  the  Entente  powers  and 
rejected  by  them,  was  now  sought.  Rumania,  whose  ear- 
lier participation  had  not  been  deemed  necessary,  was  now 
solicited  with  generous  promises  of  the  eastern  provinces 
of  Hungary.  But  at  the  same  time  the  invitation  was  ex- 
tended to  Bulgaria,  coupled  with  assurances  of  a  revision 
of  the  treaty  of  Bukharest  at  the  expense  of  Serbia,  Greece, 
and  Rumania. 

As  Italy  had  done,  Bulgaria  examined  bids  from  both 
sides,  and  chose  the  side  that  offered  most.  The  Entente 
powers  were  successful  in  the  bidding  for  Italy,  because 
what  Italy  asked  for  was  mostly  at  the  expense  of  Austria- 
Hungary,  an  enemy  country.  But  Bulgaria  could  not  have 
been  compensated  by  the  Entente  powers  without  alienat- 
ing Rumania  and  Greece.  To  the  central  empires,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  participation  of  Bulgaria  was  essential  in 
order  to  preserve  communications  with  Turkey,  and  there- 
fore they  paid  the  price.  On  July  17, 1915,  Bulgaria  signed 
a  secret  treaty  with  the  central  empires  and  Turkey.  After 
three  months  more  of  negotiations  with  both  groups  of 
belligerents,  Bulgaria  declared  war  on  Serbia  on  October 


298         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

14,  and  within  the  next  few  days  she  received  declarations 
of  war  from  Great  Britain,  France,  Russia,  and  Italy. 

Bulgaria  cooperated  with  the  central  empires  in  over- 
running Serbia.  The  Serbian  army  retreated  through  Al- 
bania, accompanied  by  a  part  of  the  civilian  population. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  perished,  through  hunger  and  ex- 
posure, from  the  attacks  of  the  pursuing  armies  and  at 
the  hands  of  Albanian  bands,  who  now  took  their  revenge 
for  the  Serbian  invasion  of  three  years  before.  In  Janu- 
ary, 1916,  the  remnant  of  the  Serbian  army  was  transferred 
to  Corfu,  which  the  Serbian  government  made  its  provi- 
sional headquarters  on  February  2. 

The  conquest  of  Serbia  put  Montenegro,  which  up  to  this 
time  had  resisted  the  Austrians  as  she  had  for  centuries 
resisted  the  Turks,  in  an  impossible  situation.  On  Novem- 
ber 30,  1915,  King  Nicholas  appealed  for  help  to  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Allies  at  Cettinje.  But  no  help  was  forth- 
coming. In  January  the  Austrians  attacked  Mount 
Lovchen,  the  great  fortress  in  the  mountains  over  Cattaro, 
and  after  four  days  captured  it.  On  January  12,  1916, 
Montenegro  concluded  an  armistice  with  Austria-Hungary, 
and  the  Austrian  army  entered  Cettinje  the  following  day. 
It  was  reported  that  the  Montenegrins  had  signed  a  capitu- 
lation, but  this  was  later  denied.  King  Nicholas  fled 
to  Rome.  Part  of  his  army  surrendered  and  the  remnant 
found  its  way  to  Corfu.  The  conquest  of  Montenegro  was 
followed  by  the  occupation  of  Scutari  on  January  23,  1916. 
From  the  Adriatic  to  the  Black  Sea  the  central  empires 
were  masters  of  a  large  part  of  the  Balkans. 

The  Serbian  disaster  was  laid  at  the  door  of  Greece, 
and  it  gave  rise  to  one  of  the  most  complicated  political 
situations  of  the  World  War.  The  Entente  governments 
claimed  that  Greece  was  pledged  to  defend  Serbia  by  the 
treaty  of  1913.  In  this  contention  and  in  the  actions  they 
took  on  the  strength  of  it  they  were  upheld  by  M.  Venizelos, 
who  had  negotiated  the  treaty  as  representative  of  Greece. 


BALKAN  STATES  IN  EUROPEAN  WAR  (1914-1917)    299 

King  Constantine,  on  the  other  hand,  advised  and  sup- 
ported by  most  of  the  statesmen  and  military  leaders  of 
Greece,  interpreted  the  treaty  differently.  He  claimed  that 
Greece  was  bound  to  aid  Serbia  only  if  she  were  attacked 
by  Bulgaria  and  were  able  to  put  an  army  of  150,000  in  the 
field  to  cooperate  with  the  Greek  army.  The  treaty,  ac- 
cording to  the  anti-Venizehsts,  was  intended  to  prevent 
any  attempt  of  Bulgaria  to  upset  the  territorial  balance 
of  power  in  the  Balkans  and  did  not  provide  for  the  con- 
tingency of  a  general  European  war.  After  the  Bulgarian 
declaration  of  war  upon  Serbia,  this  interpretation  seemed 
to  be  a  quibble,  and  many  Greeks  believed  with  Venizelos 
not  only  that  the  treaty  was  operative  but  also  that  the 
vital  interests  of  Greece  demanded  an  alliance  with  the 
group  of  powers  that  were  fighting  Greece 's  two  hereditary 
enemies,  Turkey  and  Bulgaria. 

In  the  first  month  of  the  war,  before  the  battle  of  the 
Marne,  Premier  Venizelos  had  offered  to  bring  Greece  into 
the  Entente  alliance,  but  his  overture  was  discouraged. 
Again,  when  Great  Britain  and  France  were  preparing  to 
attack  the  Dardanelles  at  the  end  of  the  first  winter,  the 
offer  was  renewed.  The  Greek  government  was  willing  to 
participate  by  land  in  the  investment  of  the  Dardanelles. 
But  the  Entente  powers  did  not  want  Greece  to  have  a  part 
in  the  capture  of  Constantinople,  because  of  their  obliga- 
tions to  Russia,  and  they  were  anxious  to  avoid  any  step 
that  might  drive  Bulgaria  into  the  opposite  camp.  Only 
after  they  saw  that  Bulgaria  was  going  to  join  their  ene- 
mies and  realized  the  peril  of  Serbia,  did  they  change 
their  attitude,  suddenly  summoning  Premier  Venizelos  to 
fulfil  the  terms  of  the  alliance  \sith  Serbia,  which  he  had 
been  willing  to  do  from  the  beginning.  When  Venizelos 
pointed  out  that  the  military  situation  had  changed  and 
that,  as  she  could  no  longer  do  it  herself,  it  was  necessary 
to  provide  for  Serbia  the  150,000  men  stipulated  in  the 
treaty  as  Serbia's  quota  in  the  campaign  against  Bulgaria, 


300         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

France  and  Great  Britain  agreed  to  furnish  this  number 
of  troops. 

Using  these  pourparlers  as  justification  for  claiming 
they  had  been  invited,  the  two  powers  notified  Veni- 
zelos  on  October  1  that  an  expeditionary  force  was 
saiUng  that  day  from  Marseilles  for  Saloniki.  Venizelos 
immediately  protested  formally  against  the  proposed  vio- 
lation of  Greek  neutrality.  The  Entente  powers  were  send- 
ing 13,000  troops  instead  of  150,000,  and  Venizelos  knew 
that  under  these  circumstances  Greek  public  opinion  would 
be  hostile  to  war  and  that  he  would  have  to  resign.  Bul- 
garia had  not  yet  declared  war,  and  the  Entente  powers, 
after  refusing  Greece's  aid  at  a  propitious  moment, 
now  tried  to  force  Greece  into  the  war,  with  inadequate 
backing  on  their  part,  at  a  time  when  the  risk  would  be 
enormous. 

Venizelos  resigned  on  October  5,  1915,  the  day  of  the 
entente  landing  at  Saloniki.  The  expeditionary  corps 
proved  unable,  as  he  had  foreseen,  either  to  save  Serbia  or 
to  protect  Greece  from  the  invasion  that  naturally  followed 
the  use  of  her  great  port  as  a  base  for  military  operations. 
At  first  the  central  empires  and  Bulgaria,  in  their  anxiety 
not  to  offend  Greece,  respected  her  neutrality,  although  it 
was  being  violated  by  their  enemies.  But  when  the  Salo- 
niki front  became  threatening  by  the  increase  of  the  En- 
tente's army  in  Macedonia,  they  invaded  Greece  and  in- 
vested Saloniki.  Frontier  fortresses  and  the  eastern  part 
of  Macedonia,  with  the  port  of  Kavala,  fell  into  the  hands 
of  the  Bulgarians.  This  proved  too  much  for  Venizelos, 
who  had  been  living  in  retirement.  Together  with  Ad- 
miral Coundouriotis,  he  went  to  Crete,  called  upon  the 
Greeks  to  rally  around  him  to  save  their  country  from  the 
Bulgarians,  and  then  set  up  a  provisional  government  at 
Saloniki  on  October  19,  1916,  which  was  recognized  by  the 
Entente  powers. 


BALKAN  STATES  IN  EUROPEAN  WAR  (1914-1917)     301 

Only  the  islands  and  the  new  provinces  of  Greece,  for 
whose  emancipation  from  Turkey  Venizelos  had  been  re- 
sponsible, adhered  to  the  Saloniki  government,  and  al- 
though the  quality  of  the  volunteers  that  flocked  to  join 
Venizelos  was  splendid,  their  number  was  not  sufficient 
to  change  for  the  better  the  precarious  military  situation 
of  the  Entente  powers  in  Macedonia.  London  and  Paris 
began  to  fear  that  the  Greeks  who  remained  loyal  to  King 
Constantine  would  attack  the  Balkan  expeditionary  corps 
in  the  rear.  The  British  and  French  ministers  at  Athens 
were  instructed  to  demand  the  withdrawal  of  the  Greek 
army  from  Thessaly,  its  partial  demobilization,  and  finally 
its  internment  in  the  Peloponnesus.  The  Greek  fleet  was 
seized  by  the  Entente  powers ;  the  expulsion  of  pro-German 
sympathizers  and  agents  was  demanded,  and  later  of  the 
ministers  and  consuls  of  the  central  powers.  On  December 
1,  1916,  sailors  and  marines,  mostly  French,  were  landed  at 
the  Piraeus  and  marched  to  Athens  to  enforce  an  ulti- 
matum; but  they  were  fired  upon,  and  had  to  retreat  to 
their  ships.  A  wholesale  massacre  was  avoided  only  by 
the  threat  of  a  naval  bombardment  of  Athens.  Rela- 
tions between  King  Constantine  and  the  Entente  powers 
gradually  reached  the  point  of  open  hostihty,  with  the 
Greek  people  divided  into  partizans  of  the  king  and  of 
Venizelos.  The  trump  card  of  the  Entente  was  its  mastery 
of  the  sea.  Greece  is  one  of  the  most  exposed  countries 
in  the  world.  There  was  no  declaration  of  war,  but  Greece 
was  blockaded,  and  finally,  on  June  11,  1917,  the  Entente 
powers  compelled  King  Constantine  to  abdicate  and  placed 
upon  the  throne  his  second  son,  Alexander.  Venizelos  was 
brought  back  from  Saloniki  and  made  premier  on  June  27. 
Three  days  later  Greece  declared  war  on  the  central 
powers,  Bulgaria,  and  Turkey. 

Long  before  the  war  Rumania  had  been  regarded  as  an 
outpost  of  the  Triple  Alhance,  not  because  of  her  sov- 


302         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ereign's  origin,^  but  because  of  the  policy  of  her  leading 
statesmen,  shown  in  many  ways,  to  favor  in  economic  as 
well  as  political  matters  the  central  empires.  Rumania 
was,  like  Italy,  an  economic  outlet  for  central  Europe.  Her 
ports,  Constanza  and  Galatz,  like  the  Italian  ports, 
Genoa  and  Venice,  were  in  large  measure  dependent 
upon  central  European  economic  prosperity.  Although 
Rumania  and  Italy  could  not  hope  to  achieve  their 
national  unity  except  to  the  detriment  of  Hungary  and 
Austria,  disappointment  over  the  award  of  Bessarabia  to 
Russia  by  the  treaty  of  Berlin  and  over  the  seizure  of 
Tunisia  by  France  inclined  the  two  countries  towards  the 
central  empires  and  helped  to  bring  Italy  into  the  Triple 
Alliance  and  Rumania  into  its  orbit.  The  belief  that  pan- 
Slavism  menaced  them  more  than  pan-Germanism  served 
to  keep  these  two  Latin  peoples  for  more  than  a  genera- 
tion in  an  association  that  was  contrary  to  their  cultural 
leanings. 

When  Italy  joined  the  Entente  alliance  in  the  spring  of 
1915,  western  Europe  believed  that  Rumania  would  follow 
her  example.  The  interventionist  party  in  Rumania  con- 
tained more  influential  political  leaders  and  bankers  than 
that  in  Italy.  But  the  increasing  military  weakness  of 
Russia,  the  failure  of  the  Entente  naval  and  military  expe- 
ditions to  force  the  Dardanelles,  and,  above  all,  the  hor- 
rible fate  of  Serbia,  which  the  Entente  powders  had  proved 
themselves  impotent  to  prevent,  were  events  that  played 
into  the  hands  of  the  able  and  distinguished  leaders  of 
the  pro-German  party.  The  argument  that  intervention 
w^as  a  great  risk  was  more  reasonable  in  Rumania  than  in 

*  Kumania,  like  most  European  countries,  had  a  dynasty  of  German  blood 
and  sympathies.  King  Constantine  of  Greece  was  brother-in-law  to  the  Ger- 
man kaiser.  King  Carol  of  Eu  mania  was  a  Hohenzollern.  He  died  shortly 
after  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  and  was  succeeded  by  his  nephew  Ferdinand, 
who  was  married  to  a  daughter  of  the  Duke  of  Saxe-Coburg  and  Gotha,  the 
family  to  which  belonged  the  royal  houses  of  Great  Britain  and  Bulgaria. 
Blood  relationship,  of  course,  did  not  necessarily  influence  the  policies  of 
countries,  and  the  easy  explanation  of  the  attitude  of  Greece  and  Rumania 
in  the  early  years  of  the  war  on  the  ground  of  dynastic  ties  is  unconvincing. 


BALKAN  STATES  IN  EUROPEAN  WAR  (1914-1917)    303 

Greece,  and  the  fears  of  the  non-interventionists  proved 
later  to  have  been  well  founded.  Rumania  allied  to  the 
Entente,  said  the  pro-Germans,  would  be  isolated  from  her 
proposed  allies,  as  was  Russia,  and  could  count  on  no  aid 
from  them  in  the  event  of  invasion. 

Considerations  of  foreign  and  internal  policy  also 
worked  against  the  Entente  in  Rumania.  Constantinople 
had  been  promised  to  Russia.  There  was  no  indication  of 
a  willingness  to  revise  the  Bessarabian  settlement  of  the 
treaty  of  Berlin.  By  bargaining  with  Bulgaria  the  Entente 
statesmen  showed  that  expediency,  and  not  friendship, 
w^as  dictating  their  Balkan  policy.  Under  conditions  less 
dangerous  than  those  faced  by  Rumania,  Greece  showed 
herself  unwilling  to  join  the  Entente.  To  the  landed 
aristocracy,  which  controlled  Rumanian  politics,  irredent- 
ism  contained  a  great  danger  to  their  privileged  position. 
Under  Hungarian  rule  the  Transylvanians  enjoyed  univer- 
sal suffrage,  while  suffrage  was  limited  in  Rumania.  In 
Transylvania  the  Rumanian  population  owned  land  in 
small  holdings  and  had  long  advocated  the  breaking  up  of 
large  estates.  If  Transylvania  were  united  with  Rumania, 
the  existing  Rumanian  oligarchical  system  would  have  to 
combat  an  aggressive  agrarian  policy. 

For  more  than  a  year  after  Italy  made  her  choice 
Rumania  hesitated  and  temporized.  The  irredentist  propa- 
ganda finally  carried  the  day.  On  August  27,  1916,  Ru- 
mania declared  war  on  Austria-Hungary  and  crossed  the 
Transylvanian  frontier.  Immediately  Germany,  Bulgaria, 
and  Turkey  declared  war  on  Rumania.  After  initial  suc- 
cesses, the  Rumanians  found  themselves  on  the  defensive. 
They  received  very  little  aid  from  Russia  and  none  from 
Great  Britain  and  France.  The  Entente  army  in  Mace- 
donia proved  impotent  to  keep  Bulgaria  occupied,  much 

If  the  throne  of  Greece  was  occupied  by  a  brother-in-law  of  a  Hohenzollern 
and  of  Kumania  by  a  Hohenzollern,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  arch- 
Hohenzollern,  Wilhelm  II,  was  a  grandson  of  Queen  Victoria  and  cousin  of 
his  greatest  enemies,  the  King  of  England  and  the  Czar  of  Eussia. 


304         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

less  give  active  aid  to  the  new  ally.  Within  three  months 
most  of  Rumania  was  conquered  by  the  armies  of  the  cen- 
tral powers  in  Bulgaria. 

At  the  beginning  of  1917  the  fortunes  of  the  entente 
powers  were  at  low  ebb  in  the  Balkans.  Their  diplomatic 
efforts  had  miscarried.  Their  military  campaigns  had 
proved  a  succession  of  failures.  The  expedition  against 
the  Dardanelles,  after  stupendous  losses,  was  withdrawn. 
The  Saloniki  army  was  marking  time.  Serbia,  Monte- 
negro, and  most  of  Rumania  were  in  the  hands  of  their 
enemies.  Greece  seemed  hopelessly  divided.  The  defec- 
tion of  Russia  was  imminent.  But  at  this  moment  Ger- 
many took  the  fatal  step  of  forcing  the  United  States  into 
the  war. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC   (1906-1917) 

BY  looking  to  Peking  to  represent  and  bind  and  be  re- 
sponsible for  all  China,  the  great  powers  first  acted  in 
ignorance.  Later,  when  they  realized  the  nature  of  the 
imperial  organization,  they  still  refused  to  accept  the  dif- 
ference between  the  Chinese  and  the  European  conception 
of  statehood.  They  insisted  upon  the  authority  and  respon- 
sibility of  the  imperial  throne,  and,  to  clothe  their  predatory 
schemes  with  a  semblance  of  legality,  they  professed  to 
regard  China  as  a  united  and  cohesive  state  at  the  very 
moment  when  they  were  conspiring  against  Chinese  unity. 
We  can  not  understand  the  phenomenon  of  the  birth  of 
the  Chinese  Republic,  involving  the  fall  of  the  Manchus  and 
the  confusing  years  of  coups  d'etat  and  civil  war,  without 
emphasizing  the  successive  attacks  of  the  great  powers 
upon  Chinese  territorial  and  political  integrity  and  their 
attempt  at  economic  enslavement  of  the  country  by  loans 
and  concessions.  If  the  Manchu  dynasty  had  made  the 
throne  the  rallying-point  of  successful  resistance  against 
all  the  powers,  there  would  have  been  no  republican  move- 
ment. But  the  weak  and  corrupt  ofiScials  at  Peking,  tol- 
erated in  the  old  days,  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  instru- 
ments of  the  ''foreign  devils."  And  they  were.  Inability 
to  prevent  the  decay  of  China,  in  the  face  of  foreign  en- 
croachment, doomed  the  Manchu  dynasty.  What  we  are 
witnessing  in  China  is  a  transformation  of  a  civilization 
into  a  nation.  It  is  not  political  evolution  from  imperial 
to  republican  institutions,  but  the  slow  and  confusing  pro- 

30o 


306  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

cess  of  the  awakening  to  national  consciousness  of  the  most 
numerous  people  in  the  world. 

The  revolution  of  1911  ^vas  preceded  by  unmistakable 
symptoms  of  a  new  spirit  in  China.  Through  the  conces- 
sions, the  opening  of  more  treaty  ports,  and  the  increase  of 
taxation,  the  Chinese  of  the  provinces  began  to  realize  that 
the  foreigners  were  insisting  that  Peking  exercise  the  pre- 
rogative of  acting  for  China  so  that  they  might  more  easily 
exploit  the  country.  The  great  powers  were  demanding 
that  the  central  government  assert  its  sovereignty,  bring 
the  provinces  under  direct  administrative  control,  and  col- 
lect taxes,  in  order  that  the  sovereignty,  the  administrative 
control,  and  the  proceeds  of  tax  collections  be  transferred 
to  them.  If  the  Peking  government  was  to  have  the  author- 
ity to  pledge  the  resources  of  China  for  the  payment  of 
interest  on  loans  and  indemnities,  to  cede  ports  and  the 
wealth  of  whole  provinces  to  foreigners,  to  open  wide  the 
door  to  foreign  exploitation,  it  was  high  time  that  the  Chi- 
nese race  became  the  Chinese  nation,  in  order  that  it  might 
defend  its  economic  interests  by  asserting  its  political  sov- 
ereignty. 

The  first  symptom  of  change  was  interest  in  military 
training.  Despite  increased  taxation,  public  opinion  sup- 
ported the  raising  of  armies.  After  ihe  Boxer  uprising, 
military  drill  was  introduced  into  the  curriculum  of  schools. 
Sons  of  princes  and  nobles  were  encouraged  to  enter  the 
army,  and  in  the  autumn  of  1906,  after  the  reorganization 
along  Occidental  lines  was  begun,  in  a  single  month  young 
men  offered  themselves  for  military  service  in  larger  num- 
ber than  had  been  the  total  strength  of  the  Chinese  army. 

The  second  symptom  wasi  interest  in  administrative, 
financial,  educational,  and  social  reforms.  The  imperial 
edict  of  September  1,  1906,  marked  the  beginning  of  the 
effort  to  follow  the  example  of  Japan,  that  is,  to  accept 
Occidental  ways  of  doing  things,  not  because  they  were  be- 
lieved to  be  superior,  but  because  self-defense  demanded 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC  (1906-1917)  307 

the  transformation.^  China  had  never  before  been  faced 
with  the  necessity  of  raising  enormous  sums  of  money  to 
be  paid  out  by  a  central  government.  The  Chinese,  except 
at  a  few  places  on  the  coast,  had  never  before  seen  foreign- 
ers appear  in  the  ports,  on  river-banks,  and  in  the  prov- 
inces, with  authority  from  Peking  to  seize  land  and  to  take 
over  its  administration.  The  struggle  for  existence  against 
the  foreigner,  including  the  Japanese  neighbor,  necessi- 
tated learning  how  to  do  things  as  they  were  done  else- 
where. Cutting  off  pigtails,  abandoning  baby  shoes  for 
women,  revising  the  examination  system  for  civil  service, 
going  abroad  or  to  foreign  institutions  to  study,  exhibiting 
sudden  jealousy  over  the  maintenance  of  Chinese  sover- 
eignty in  Tibet  and  Mongolia,  clamoring  for  universal  suf- 
frage and  representative  government,  recognizing  the 
equality  of  women — these  leaves  have  been  taken  from  our 
book  by  the  Chinese  in  order  that  they  might  better  be  able 
to  keep  us  from  preying  upon  them. 

The  third  symptom  was  the  growing  tendency  to  show 
openly  hostility  to  foreigners.  As  xenophobia  was  no 
longer  confined  to  reactionaries  and  coolies,  the  old  sooth- 
ing explanations  of  anti-foreign  agitation  had  become  in- 
adequate. For  it  was  traced,  not  to  officials  who  resented 
the  diminishing  of  their  ability  to  graft,  to  villagers  who 
did  not  like  the  ways  and  actions  of  missionaries,  and  to 
peasants  the  graves  of  whose  ancestors  were  being  dis- 
turbed by  railway  construction,  but  to  the  Chinese  edu- 
cated abroad,  who  were  returning  in  great  numbers  to 
point  out  to  their  fellow  countrymen  the  shame  of  being 
exploited  economically  and  of  not  being  master  in  their 
own  house.  It  is  impossible  for  an  intelligent  Chinese  to 
travel  abroad  or  even  to  study  in  a  foreign  institution  in 

*  Four  months  after  the  edict  of  reforms,  the  edict  of  December  31,  1906, 
was  promulgated,  raising  Confucius  to  the  same  rank  as  heaven  and  earth. 
Although  most  of  the  younger  leaders  of  the  revolutionary  movement  were 
graduates  or  former  students  of  Christian  schools,  the  Young  Chinese  wanted 
it  to  be  clearly  understood  that  they  had  no  connection  with  any  miBsionarj 
propaganda. 


308         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

China  without  becoming  convinced  that  his  people  are  suf- 
fering indignities  and  injustices  at  the  hands  of  foreigners 
in  their  own  country.  Therefore  the  very  fact  of  his  edu- 
cation in  foreign  concepts  and  foreign  ways,  since  it  opens 
his  eyes  to  the  infamy  of  the  treatment  of  his  people,  makes 
him  an  anti-foreign  propagandist.  He  can  see  no  justifica- 
tion for  the  conduct  of  the  powers ;  they  are  simply  bullies, 
availing  themselves  of  their  superior  strength.  Xenopho- 
bia is  the  most  encouraging  sign  of  changing  China.  For 
it  indicates  a  development  of  political  self-respect  and  a 
proper  conception  of  the  obligaitions  and  privileges  of 
nationhood.  Only  freemen  are  able  to  create  a  modern 
state.  Xenophobia  will  grow  in  China  rapidly  as  education 
spreads  and  intercourse  with  the  outside  world  increases. 

Concentration  of  power  in  the  hands  of  the  imperial  gov- 
ernment, which  began  in  1907,  led  to  a  movement  for  demo- 
cratic control,  and  the  primary  reason  given  by  leaders  in 
the  agitation  in  the  provinces  for  the  overthrow  of  autoc- 
racy was  that  the  establishment  of  representative  gov- 
ernment at  Peking  was  the  only  means  of  resisting  the 
continuance  of  concession-granting  with  its  consequent  en- 
croachment by  European  powers  and  Japan  upon  Chinese 
sovereignty.  At  every  meeting  held  in  support  of  the  pro- 
gram of  reforms  a  constitutional  system  of  government 
was  advocated,  and  the  resolutions  voted  contained  a  para- 
graph calling  upon  Peking  to  refuse  the  demands  of  all 
foreign  governments  for  further  favors.  At  a  great  dem- 
onstration at  Canton  there  was  a  protest  against  British 
vessels  of  war  doing  police  work  in  Chinese  waters.  In 
1908  the  leaders  of  the  constitutional  movement  announced 
that  it  would  result  in  the  control  of  all  railways  and  mines 
by  Chinese  and  the  abolition  of  Russian  and  Japanese  ad- 
ministration and  jurisdiction  in  Manchuria. 

In  November,  1908,  the  old  empress  dowager  died,  leav- 
ing the  government  in  the  hands  of  a  group  of  nobles  and 
generals,  who  promulgated  laws  in  the  name  of  the  five- 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC   (1906-1917)  309 

year-old  emperor.  The  first  step  toward  constitutional 
government  was  the  convocation  of  an  imperial  assembly 
on  October  3,  1910,  to  consider  the  problem  of  meeting  the 
growth  of  the  popular  revolutionary  movement.  Of  the 
two  hundred  members,  one  half  were  Manchus — imperial 
princes  or  dukes,  clansmen,  hereditary  nobles,  high  func- 
tionaries, and  great  lando^vners.  The  other  half  were  mem- 
bers of  provincial  assembhes  who  had  been  chosen  by  the 
viceroys.  The  imperial  assembly,  realizing  that  the  popu- 
lar demand  for  parliamentary  government  could  not  be 
ignored,  recommended  that  elections  be  held  for  a  national 
parliament.  The  government,  which  had  wanted  to  post- 
pone constitutional  changes  for  seven  years,  compromised 
on  three  years.  On  November  4,  1910,  an  edict  appeared 
promising  the  inauguration  of  the  parliament  in  1913,  and 
setting  forth  regulations  for  the  constitution  of  the  cabinet 
and  parliament  and  for  holding  a  general  election.  The 
assembly  was  not  satisfied  that  it  would  be  safe  to  wait 
even  three  years,  but  it  had  no  power  to  amend  the  edict, 
and  before  adjourning  warned  the  government  against 
sanctioning  a  foreign  loan  and  against  granting  further 
concessions  to  foreigners. 

Under  pressure  of  foreign  diplomats  and  foreign  finan- 
ciers, the  imperial  government  did  not  listen  to  the  warning. 
This  was  the  direct  cause  of  the  revolution  that  led  to 
China  becoming  a  constitutional  state  as  a  republic  rather 
than  as  an  empire.  An  epidemic  of  bubonic  plague  was 
taken  advantage  of  by  Russia  and  Japan  to  get  Chinese 
and  international  acknowledgment  of  their  sovereignty  and 
spheres  of  influence  in  Manchuria.  When  Russia  estab- 
lished consulates  in  towns  where  importance  of  trade  was 
no  excuse,  when  Mongol  princes  visited  Petrograd,  and 
when  Peking  refused  to  allow  the  viceroy  of  Yunnan  to 
take  measures  to  prevent  the  British  from  extending  the 
frontier  of  Burma,  the  Chinese  became  thoroughly  alarmed. 
The  last  straw  was  the  signing  of  railway  agreements  with 


310         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

foreign  financiers  and  the  borrowing  of  money  from  a  for- 
eign group  for  currency  reform  and  industrial  enterprises 
in  Manchuria.  Revolution  broke  out  in  south  China;  and 
the  Manchu  garrisons  were  massacred  in  most  cities. 

Yuan-Shih-Kai,  who  was  successfully  leading  an  army 
against  the  revolutionaries,  had  to  be  recalled  to  Peking 
to  assume  the  premiership.  But  neither  his  military  nor 
political  ability  could  save  the  Manchu  dynasty.  Province 
after  province  went  over  to  the  revolution,  and  the  admiral 
of  the  Yangtze  fleet  joined  the  rebels.  Yuan-Shih-Kai 
failed  in  his  attempt  to  form  a  coalition  cabinet.  Some  of 
those  whom  he  asked  to  join  him,  such  as  Wu  Ting  Fang, 
former  minister  to  the  United  States,  responded  by  becom- 
ing members  of  the  republican  government  that  had  been 
proclaimed  at  Shanghai.  At  the  beginning  of  December 
the  regent  resigned.  Yuan-Shih-Kai  agreed  to  an  armis- 
tice and  proposed  federal  government  for  China.  The 
revolutionaries,  however,  instead  insisted  that  the  Manchu 
dynasty  abdicate  and  a  republic  be  proclaimed.  On  the 
last  day  of  the  year.  Doctor  Sun  Yat  Sen,  organizer  of  the 
revolution,  who  had  lived  for  fourteen  years  in  exile  and 
had  just  returned,  was  unanimously  elected  president  at 
Shanghai.  On  January  5,  1912,  a  manifesto  to  the  foreign 
powers  proclaimed  the  establishment  of  the  republic.  Two 
weeks  later  the  success  of  the  movement  was  assured  by 
the  decision  of  Dr.  Sun  Yat  Sen  to  resign  the  presidency  in 
favor  of  Yuan-Shih-Kai,  provided  the  emperor  abdicated 
and  all  the  provinces  agreed. 

While  the  diplomats  looked  on  bewildered,  the  revolu- 
tion marched  apace.  On  February  12  the  emperor  abdi- 
cated, after  having  signed  a  decree  creating  a  constitu- 
tional republic.  Yuan-Shih-Kai  was  ordered  to  establish 
a  provisional  government  in  conjunction  with  the  revolu- 
tionaries. Five  days  later  this  appointment  was  confirmed 
by  representatives  of  seventeen  provinces,  who  voted  at 
the  same  time  the  adoption  of  the  Western  calendar.    On 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC  (1906-1917)  311 

March  16  Yuan-Shih-Kai  was  inaugurated  first  president 
of  China,  and  on  April  1  the  president  and  members  of  the 
cabinet  of  the  revolutionary  government  gave  up  their 
seals  of  oflSce.  Parliament  was  to  be  summoned  within  six 
months. 

Public  opinion  in  America,  Europe,  and  Japan  was  far 
'from  being  hostile  to  the  Chinese  Republic.  As  in  the  case 
of  the  establishment  of  a  constitutional  regime  in  Turkey, 
press  comment  was  universally  sympathetic.  But  foreign- 
ers who  were  in  business  in  China  and  the  European  diplo- 
mats in  the  Far  East  did  not  want  to  see  the  constitutional 
movement  succeed.  They  knew  that  if  the  old  system  of 
governing  China  were  done  away  with,  it  would  mean  a 
serious  curtailment  of  their  opportunities  to  exploit  China 
and  to  negotiate  with  one  another  at  her  expense.  Natur- 
ally, they  still  wanted  to  grind  their  axes  by  bribing  or  in- 
timidating corrupt  officials  who  were  not  answerable  for 
their  actions  to  a  parliament. 

The  great  powers  withheld  recognition  of  the  republic, 
and  Yuan-Shih-Kai  quickly  found  that  the  foreigners  were 
determined  not  to  allow  a  constitutional  government  to 
function.  With  the  exception  of  the  United  States  (whose 
sympathy,  however,  has  never  gone  beyond  words),  the 
powers  have  consistently  refused  to  give  China  a  chance  to 
inaugurate  and  develop  administrative  reforms  and  put 
her  treasury  in  order.  The  host  of  treaty  provisions,  be- 
ginning with  the  treaty  of  Nanking,  forced  on  China  after 
Great  Britain's  Opium  War,  were  based  upon  the  funda- 
mental differences  existing  between  Occidental  and  Oriental 
institutions.  The  foreigners  could  not  trust  the  Chinese 
government  to  protect  them  or  to  give  them  justice  in 
courts;  hence  the  necessity  of  extra-territoriality,  with 
foreign  police  (after  the  Boxer  Rebellion  detachments  of 
foreign  armies,  which  never  went  home),  foreign  courts, 
foreign  districts  and  treaty  ports,  leaseholds,  and  in  some 
cases  outright  cessions  of  territory.    The  postal  adminis- 


312  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tration  was  deficient;  hence  the  foreign  post-offices,  tele- 
graph lines,  cables,  and  wireless  stations  under  foreign 
control.  The  Chinese  had  curious  ideas  of  finance;  hence 
they  were  not  allowed  to  have  anything  to  do  with  taxes 
where  the  foreigners  ruled,  or  to  fix  tariffs  or  collect  cus- 
toms duties.  At  the  point  of  the  sword — or,  more  literally, 
at  the  war-ship's  cannon  mouth — China  kept  signing  the 
treaties  drawm  up  by  the  foreigners,  in  none  of  which  was 
there  reciprocity.  And  now,  when  China  tried  to  follow 
Occidental  methods  of  government,  she  was  told  that  she 
must  remain  as  she  was.^ 

Yuan-Shih-Kai's  first  experience  with  this  concerted  de- 
termination was  when  the  foreign  ministers  in  Peking 
denied  his  right  to  borrow  money  in  the  open  market  and 
frustrated  the  Chinese  effort  to  float  a  foreign  loan  in  any 
other  way  than  through  legation  channels.  The  formation 
of  an  army  was  alarming  Russia  and  Japan,  who  conceived 
a  scheme  for  limiting  China's  ability  to  command  respect 
for  her  sovereignty — a  banking  group  of  six  powers,  with 
the  stipulation  that  China  should  get  no  money  unless  she 
promised  not  to  spend  for  military  purposes  more  than  one 
twentieth  of  what  she  borrowed.  The  new  government 
gave  European  diplomacy  a  terrible  jolt  by  negotiating  a 
loan  of  ten  million  pounds  with  a  private  British  firm  on 

^  During  the  discussions  over  the  restrictions  imposed  by  the  powers  upon 
China  at  the  Limitation  of  Armaments  Conference  (session  of  November  22, 
1921),  Senator  Underwood  declared  that  these  restrictions  were  so  sweeping 
as  to  make  it  impossible  for  China  "to  go  forward  upon  any  scheme  for 
political  and  territorial  freedom. ' '  Senator  Underwood  said  that  he  had 
been  impressed  with  the  fact  that  China  was  not  being  given  a  chance  to 
establish  a  stable  financial  policy,  and  that  this  could  not  be  done  until  she 
was  ' '  unhampered  by  treaty  inhibitions. ' '  The  powers  have  refused  China 
the  riglit  exercised  by  other  countries  to  establish  their  own  customs  duties 
and  make  differential  schedules.  For  the  sake  of  their  trade  and  to  the  ruin 
of  China,  they  insist  upon  a  five  per  cent,  ad  valorem  duty,  and  China  is 
powerless  to  protect  any  of  her  own  industries  or  to  tax  heavily  imported 
luxuries.  The  customs  duties  and  railway  receipts  are  deposited  in  foreign 
banks,  which  pay  the  coupons  on  loans.  But  these  banks  not  only  get  the 
benefit  of  the  money  deposited  until  the  coupons  are  cashed,  but  also  postpone 
for  a  long  time  payment  of  balances  due  the  Chinese  government.  The  Wash- 
ington conference  made  a  small  beginning  towards  rectifying  these  injustices, 
but  most  of  them  are  still  maintained. 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC   (1906-1917)  313 

easier  terms  than  those  laid  down  by  the  six-power  group — 
and  without  any  clause  arbitrarily  restricting  her  military 
budget.  But  "when  the  chancelleries  recovered  they  brought 
united  pressure  to  bear  both  upon  the  independent  British 
bankers  and  upon  the  Peking  government  to  cancel  the 
loan  arrangements. 

Elections  were  held  at  the  beginning  of  1913,  and  on 
April  8  the  first  parliament  was  inaugurated  at  Peking. 
Five  hundred  of  the  596  representatives  and  177  of  the  274 
senators  were  present.  Never  in  history  had  so  large  and 
representative  a  body  of  delegates  of  the  Chinese  provinces 
met.  It  would  have  been  surprising  had  difficulties  not 
arisen.  It  was  in  the  nature  of  things  that  from  the  begin- 
ning Yuan-Shih-Kai  should  meet  with  opposition  from  his 
old  enemies,  the  original  revolutionaries.  Before  long  a 
revolt  broke  out  in  the  Yangtze  Valley,  w^hich  spread  in  the 
south,  at  the  head  of  which  were  Doctor  Sun  Yat  Sen  and 
others  of  the  first  Canton  government. 

Yuan-Shih-Kai 's  difficulties  were  greatly  enhanced  by 
the  attitude  of  the  powers,  whose  pressure  upon  him,  while 
they  still  refused  to  recognize  him,  was  enormous.  If  he 
acceded  to  their  demands  the  rebellion  in  the  south  was 
bound  to  gain  in  strength.  If  he  refused  to  continue  to  sell 
out  the  interests  of  China,  as  the  old  imperial  government 
had  done,  the  foreign  ministers  were  ready  to  combine  to 
prevent  him  from  getting  money  to  carry  on  his  govern- 
ment. The  British  tried  to  get  him  to  admit  the  virtual 
independence  of  Tibet  and  the  Russians  of  Mongolia,  while 
the  Russians  and  Japanese  were  acting  as  if  Manchuria 
was  altogether  lost  to  China.  The  powers  backed  their 
financiers  in  imposing  a  large  loan,  under  onerous  condi- 
tions, from  a  consortium  of  banks,  which  was  secured  by 
mortgaging  the  salt  revenues  and  the  future  surplus  of 
maritime  customs.  One  of  its  stipulations,  i.e.,  that  the 
foreign  interests  should  have  inspectors  and  advisers  in 
the  various  departments  of  the  ministry  of  finance,  was 


314         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

one  more  step  to  bring  the  country  under  foreign 
control. 

The  nefw  revolt  was  put  down  before  the  end  of  the  sum- 
mer. In  the  presidential  election,  held  in  October,  Yuan- 
Shih-Kai  was  overwhelmingly  chosen  president  for  the  term 
of  five  years.  In  November,  when  parliament  was  consid- 
ering the  limitation  of  the  power  of  the  president,  he  de- 
clared vacant  the  seats  of  the  members  of  the  southern 
party,  thus  excluding  nearly  half  of  the  senators  and  more 
than  half  of  the  representatives.  On  January  11,  1914,  he 
dissolved  the  parliament  and  appointed  a  committee  to 
draft  a  constitution,  which  proposed  a  one-chamber  parlia- 
ment, abolishing  the  cabinet,  and  substituting  for  the  prime 
minister,  who  was  responsible  to  parliament,  a  secretary 
of  state  who  would  act  under  the  direct  order  of  the 
president. 

When  the  European  war  broke  out  Yuan-Shih-Kai  was 
the  dictator  of  China,  although  his  authority  was  by  no 
means  recognized  everywhere.  He  had  against  him  the 
exiled  revolutionaries  and  the  Manchu  conspirators,  who 
represented  the  two  extremes.  He  was  facing  the  serious 
uprising  of  the  mysterious  ''White  Wolf."  The  powers 
were  still  at  work  in  outlying  provinces,  instigating  agents 
who  were  undermining  or  denying  the  authority  of  the  re- 
public— Russia  in  Mongolia,  Great  Britain  in  Tibet,  France 
in  Yunnan,  Germany  in  Shantung,  Japan  in  Fukien,  and 
Russia  and  Japan  in  Manchuria.  The  president  had  to  ac- 
cept the  unpopularity  of  increasing  taxation  to  meet  obli- 
gations to  foreign  powers,  and  of  enforcing  respect  for  the 
concessions,  which  intelligent  Chinese  knew  were  in  large 
part  being  developed  in  a  spirit  and  with  an  intention  that 
the  powers  would  never  tolerate  in  their  own  countries. 
After  Japan  entered  the  war,  Yuan-Shih-Kai  was  con- 
fronted mth  a  new  situation,  due  to  the  substitution  of 
Japan  for  Germany  in  the  Shantung  peninsula. 

Japan  took  advantage  of  the  preoccupation  of  the  Euro- 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC  (1906-1917)  315 

pean  pofw^ers  to  present  her  twenty-one  demands.^  Yuan- 
Shih-Kai  issued  a  remarkable  manifesto.  He  admitted  that 
China  had  suffered  by  the  concessions  in  Manchuria  and 
Mongolia,  and  was  exposed  to  a  more  serious  menace  than 
had  existed  before  in  the  fact  that  Japan  was  now  installed 
on  both  sides  of  the  capital.  He  expressed  sorrow  and 
shame  for  the  humiliation  the  country  was  being  forced  to 
bear,  but  pointed  out  that  the  weakness  of  the  Chinese  peo- 
ple made  these  renunciations  of  sovereignty  and  impair- 
ments of  national  interests  impossible  to  avoid.  Only  when 
China  became  a  strong  nation,  able  to  defend  herself 
against  all  the  world,  could  her  wrongs  be  righted. 

At  the  end  of  1915,  despite  the  virtual  veto  of  the  Entente 
powers,  the  council  of  state,  after  a  dubious  referendum 
to  the  provinces,  formally  asked  Yuan-Shih-Kai  to  become 
emperor.    His  consent  was  a  signal  for  a  new  revolt.    On 
December  26,  1915,  the  province  of  Yunnan  declared  its 
independence,  and  governors  of  other  provinces  began  to 
send  threatening  communications  to  Peking.     The  coro- 
nation had  been  fixed  for  February  9,  1916,  but  at  the  end 
of  January  Yuan-Shih-Kai  announced  that  the  change  of 
regime  had  been  indefinitely  postponed.    This  did  not  calm 
the  rebels.    By  the  end  of  April  seven  provinces  of  south 
China  had  separated  from  Peking.     Despite  Yuan-Shih- 
Kai 's  declaration  that  the  scheme  to  reestablish  the  mon- 
archy was  totally  abandoned,  the  movement  kept  spreading. 
On  June  6  Yuan-Shih-Kai  conveniently  died.    The  vice- 
president,  Li  Yuan  Hung,  who  succeeded  according  to  the 
provisions  of  the  constitution,  declared  that  he  was  a  con- 
stitutionalist and  gave  proof  of  his  good  faith  by  reassem- 
bling the  old  parliament  within  two  months  of  his  succession. 
As    he    was    acceptable    to    the    south,    unity    was    tem- 
porarily restored.    But  the  north  and  the  south  remained 
divided  on  questions  of  policy.    The  southern  leaders  were 
liberals  or  radicals.     Those  of  the  north,  recruited  from 

*  See  pp.  324-325. 


316         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

military  men  who  had  been  under  the  training  of  Yuan- 
Shih-Kai,  believed  that  the  first  duties  of  the  republic  were 
to  build  up  a  large  army  and  to  organize  a  centralized  sys- 
tem like  that  of  France. 

Most  Chinese  w^ere  profoundly  indifferent  to  the  war  in 
Europe.    Having  been  treated  abominably  by  all  the  pow- 
ers, they  were  unable  to  see  the  force  of  the  claim  that  the 
Entente  powers  w^ere  fighting  to  establish  the  rights  of  weak 
nations  throughout  the  world  and  to  put  right  above  might 
as  the  norm  of  conduct  in  international  relations.    Chinese 
reactionaries  and  military  men  had  sympathy  and  admira- 
tion for  Germany,  but  not  more  than  the  same  classes  in 
Japan  and  Russia,  both  of  which  countries  were  at  war  with 
Germany.    Chinese  liberals  believed  in  the  principles  pro- 
claimed by  the  Entente  leaders  and  held  imperial  Germany 
in  abhorrence.    But  two  members  of  the  Entente  Alliance, 
Russia  and  Japan,  were  doing  in  China  what  they  were 
fighting  to  prevent  Germany  from  accomplishing  in  Europe. 
From  their  own  country's  experience  during  the  last  half 
century,  France  and  Great  Britain  were  known  to  have  a 
double  standard  of  morality,  because  they  treated  Asiatic 
peoples  in  the  way  they  condemned  and  proclaimed  a  cru- 
sade against  the  central  empires  for  treating  European 
peoples.     Chinese  neutrality  was  therefore  in  sympathy 
with  the  attitude  of  the  public  mind,  and  could  not  have 
been  changed  to  belligerency  by  propaganda  coming  from 
the  outside.    Chinese  statesmen  were  ready  from  the  begin- 
ning to  join  the  Entente,  but  this  was  for  the  sole  reason  of 
thwarting  Japan  in  Shantung  and  winning  the  support  of 
the  powers  in  the  resistance  to  the  twenty-one  demands. 
Japan  saw  this,  and  opposed  the  intervention  of  China. 
But  her  opposition  might  not  have  succeeded  had  the  Chi- 
nese been  eager  to  fight  Germany. 

The  break  between  the  United  States  and  Germany  com- 
pletely changed  the  situation.  The  Chinese  had  been  fol- 
lowing closely  President  Wilson's  speeches.    The  analogy 


CHINA  AS  A  REPUBLIC   (1906-1917)  317 

between  their  own  wrongs  and  those  bitterly  denounced 
by  the  American  president,  and  the  wonderful  vis  I  a  of  in- 
dependence opened  to  China  by  the  proposed  application 
of  the  Wilsonian  principles,  inspired  the  Chinese  with  the 
determination  to  enter  the  war,  because  it  had  now  become 
a  world  war,  and  to  aid  in  the  triumph  of  the  ideal  of  an 
association  of  nations,  in  which  the  defense  of  a  nation's 
rights  did  not  depend  wholly  upon  a  nation's  own  strength 
or  its  usefulness  as  a  pawn  in  the  game  of  world  politics. 

China  was  formally  invited  by  the  United  States  to  enter 
the  war.  A  note  was  sent  to  Germany  breaking  off  diplo- 
matic relations.  But  there  was  delay  in  the  actual  declara- 
tion of  war,  because  the  southern  party  did  not  want  to 
strengthen  the  hands  of  the  northern  party  by  giving  the 
government  the  opportunity  of  exercising  arbitrary  power 
by  proclaiming  a  state  of  siege,  which  would  probably 
follow  the  declaration  of  war.  The  southerners  asked  that 
before  war  was  declared  a  new  cabinet  be  formed,  with  a 
larger  representation  for  the  south.  Civil  war  broke  out 
again  in  August,  1917,  when  the  southern  provinces  se- 
ceded, and  China  is  still  suffering  from  a  division  that 
increases  her  weakness. 

The  civil  dissensions  in  China,  however,  had  not  meant 
differences  of  opinion  in  regard  to  foreign  affairs.  "When 
President  Li  declared  war  upon  Germany  and  Austria- 
Hungary  on  August  14,  1917,  it  was  not  the  fact,  but  the 
illegal  method  of  accomplishing  it,  against  which  the  south- 
erners protested.  The  southern  government,  w^hose  head- 
quarters are  at  Canton,  worked  with  the  northern  govern- 
ment to  present  and  defend  the  Chinese  point  of  view  both 
at  the  Paris  conference  of  1919  and  the  Washington  con- 
ference of  1921. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

JAPAN'S  THIKD  CHALLENGE  TO  EUROPE:    THE  WAR  WITH 
GERMANY    AND    THE    TWENTY-ONE    DEMANDS   OK    CHINA 

(1914-1916) 

LESS  than  ten  years  after  Great  Britain  agreed  to  ac- 
cept Japan  as  an  equal,  the  Anglo-Japanese  treaty 
was  signed.  This  ''agreement  for  guaranteeing  peace  in 
the  Far  East,"  made  in  1902,  was  replaced  by  a  treaty  of 
alliance  in  1905.  The  rapprochement  proved  popular  in 
both  countries  and  worked  out  to  the  advantage  of  both- 
and  it  was  revised  and  renewed  for  ten  years  in  1911.  The 
influence  of  the  Anglo-French  and  Anglo-Russian  treaties 
was  felt  almost  immediately  in  the  Far  East.  Japan  en- 
tered into  agreements  with  France  in  1907  and  with  Russia 
in  1907  and  1910.  Germany  was  diplomatically  isolated  in 
Asia  as  in  Africa.  When  Japan  entered  the  European  war, 
she  became  an  integral  member  of  the  Entente  Alliance  and 
signed  the  pact  of  London.  A  closely  knit  convention  with 
Russia  in  1916  completed  the  prestige  of  Japan  as  a  great 
power. 

The  Pacific  islands  of  Germany  cost  more  than  they 
brought  in,  afforded  no  opportunity  for  settlement  and 
very  little  for  trade,  and  interested  chiefly  missionaries. 
Their  only  value  was  for  naval  purposes.  They  gave  Ger- 
many places  she  could  call  her  own  on  the  path  from  Amer- 
ica to  Australia  and  from  Asia  to  Australia.  They  afforded 
an  opportunity  for  coaling  stations,  for  cable  landings,  and 
for  wireless  telegraphy.  And  that  was  all.  But  to  Ger- 
many they  looked  important  because  they  were  aU  that 
Germany  had. 

318 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  GERMANY  (1914-1916)        319 

As  Germany  was  not  mistress  of  the  sea,  she  had  no 
means  of  defending  these  possessions  when  the  European 
war  broke  out.  Kaiser  Willielm's  Land,  on  the  mainland 
of  New  Guinea,  was  seized  by  the  Australians  at  the  begin- 
ning of  September,  1914.  New  Zealand  sent  an  expedi- 
tionary force  to  Samoa.  The  Japanese  gathered  in  the 
other  groups  of  islands.  Before  the  end  of  1914  Great 
Britain  and  Japan  agreed  upon  the  division  of  the  booty. 
Samoa  went  to  New  Zealand,  the  German  islands  south  of 
the  equator  to  Australia,  and  those  north  of  the  equator  to 
Japan. 

The  one  possession  of  Germany  in  Asia  that  had  intrinsic 
economic  value  was  the  foothold  secured  in  China  in  1897.^ 
The  military  efforts  of  the  German  government  were  con- 
centrated on  making  at  Tsing-tau,  on  the  tip  of  the  northern 
promontory  of  Kiau-chau  Bay,  a  powerful  fortress.  But 
the  idea  of  creating  a  naval  base  was  linked  from  the  be- 
ginning with  the  plan  of  developing  a  port  as  a  commercial 
outlet  for  the  whole  province  of  Shantung.  In  the  fifteen 
years  from  1899  to  1914,  Tsing-tau  was  transformed  from 
a  fishing  village  into  a  railway  terminus  and  port,  equipped 
with  every  modern  improvement,  and  representing  an 
investment  of  hundreds  of  millions  of  marks.  In  govern- 
ment buildings,  warehouses,  and  dock  facilities,  Tsing- 
tau  became  a  model  of  European  enterprise  in  the  Far 
East. 

Early  in  August,  1914,  the  British  government  asked 
Japan  to  intervene  in  the  war  under  the  terms  of  the  Anglo- 
Japanese  alliance.  It  was  pointed  out  to  Japan  that  Ger- 
man cruisers  and  armed  vessels  were  a  menace  to  com- 
merce, and  that  therefore  the  disturbance  of  ''the  peace  of 
the  Far  East  and  the  immediate  interests  of  the  Japanese 
as  well  as  of  the  British  Empire"  made  operative  the  alli- 
ance. Great  Britain  wanted  German  influence  destroyed 
in  China. 

*  The    lease    was    not    signed    until    March    6,    1898,    and    the    district   was 
declared  a  protectorate  on  April  27. 


320         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  YfORLD  POLITICS 

The  reward  held  out  to  Japan  was  permission  to  take 
over  the  German  lease  of  Kiau-chau  and  the  German  con- 
cessions of  Shantung.    Baron  Kato  said  to  parliament: 

**  Japan  has  no  desire  or  inclination  to  become  involved  in 
the  present  conflict.  But  she  believes  she  owes  it  to  herself 
to  be  faithful  to  the  alliance  with  Great  Britain  and  to 
strengthen  its  foundation  by  insuring  permanent  peace  in 
the  East  and  protecting  the  special  interests  of  the  two 
Allied  Powers.  Desiring,  how^ever,  to  solve  the  situation 
by  pacific  means,  the  Imperial  Government  has  given  the 
following  advice  to  the  German  Government." 

The  advice  was  an  ultimatum  to  Germany,  presented  on 
August  15,  1914,  asking  for  the  immediate  withdrawal  of 
German  men-of-war  and  armed  vessels  of  all  kinds  from 
Chinese  and  Japanese  waters,  and  the  delivery  at  a  date 
not  later  than  September  15  of  the  entire  leased  territory 
of  Kiau-chau  to  the  Japanese  authorities,  with  a  view  to  the 
eventual  restoration  of  the  same  to  China.  An  uncondi- 
tional acceptance  of  the  ''advice"  was  asked  by  noon  on 
August  23.  Japan  couched  the  ultimatum,  even  to  the  use 
of  the  word  "advice,"  on  the  terms  of  the  Russo-Franco- 
German  ultimatum  concerning  the  restoration  of  Liao- 
tung  to  China,  when  the  three  powers  had  combined  to  pre- 
vent the  execution  of  the  treaty  of  Shimonoseki.  It  took 
ten  years  for  Japan  to  get  even  with  Russia.  After  t^venty 
years  the  opportunity  came  to  punish  Germany. 

Germany  ignored  the  ultimatum.  On  August  23  Japan 
declared  war  and  blockaded  Kiau-chau.  The  Germans  had 
only  four  thousand  soldiers  and  sailors  in  the  fortress  of 
Tsing-tau.  There  was  no  hope  of  relief  by  land  or  sea. 
Although  not  previously  consulted,  the  Chinese  government 
saw  through  the  Japanese  game.  China  offered  to  join  the 
Entente  powers,  and  could  very  easily  have  undertaken  the 
investment  of  Tsing-tau  by  land.    Japan  did  not  need  to 


JAPAN'S  WAR  "WITH  GERMANY  (1914-1916)         321 

send  a  single  soldier.  But  the  offer  of  China  was  rejected. 
Furthermore,  instead  of  immediately  investing  the  German 
fortress,  Japan  landed  twenty  thousand  troops  at  Lung- 
chow,  on  the  northern  coast  of  Shantung,  a  hundred  and 
fifty  miles  away  from  the  Germans.  They  were  in  no  hurry 
to  attack  the  fortress.  During  the  month  of  September  the 
Japanese  took  possession  of  the  railway  line  all  the  way 
from  Kiau-chau  Bay  to  Tsinan,  and  the  German  mining 
properties.  They  occupied  the  principal  cities  of  the  penin- 
sula,— places  that  the  Germans  had  never  gone  to, — seized 
the  Chinese  postal  and  telegraph  offices,  and  expelled  the 
Chinese  employees  from  the  railway.  The  investment  and 
capture  of  Tsing-tau  was  a  matter  of  a  few  days.  But  the 
bombardment  and  assault  of  the  forts,  in  which  fifteen 
hundred  British  soldiers  cooperated,  did  not  occur  until  the 
end  of  October.  In  the  meantime  the  Japanese  were  in- 
stalled in  one  of  the  richest  provinces  of  China  in  a  way  the 
Germans  had  never  planned. 

The  garrison  of  Tsing-tau  capitulated  on  November  7, 
1914.  The  Japanese  permitted  the  governor  and  officers  to 
retain  their  swords,  and  when  the  vanquished  arrived  at 
Tokio  they  were  met  by  Japanese  women  who  offered  them 
flowers. 

When  the  expulsion  of  the  Germans  from  Shantung  was 
followed  by  disasters  to  the  Russians,  Japan  began  to 
breathe  more  freely  than  at  any  time  since  she  became  a 
modern  state.  The  collapse  of  Russia  changed  the  political 
situation  of  the  Far  East  to  the  advantage  of  Japan  much 
more  than  the  expulsion  of  German  influence  from  China 
and  the  islands  of  the  Pacific.  Then,  too,  the  European  war 
was  dragging  on.  The  Japanese  watched  with  satisfaction 
and  delight  the  increasing  exhaustion  of  Europe.  All  the 
European  states  were  losing  the  flower  of  their  manhood 
and  piling  up  huge  war  debts.  Their  energies  were  turned 
from  productive  industries.    Their  shipping  was  being  sunk 


322         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

by  submarines  or  requisitioned  for  war  purposes.  This  was 
the  opportunity  for  Japanese  commerce  and  shipping.  It 
was  also  the  first  assurance  Japan  had  ever  been  able  to 
count  upon  that  European  aggression  in  the  Far  East  need 
no  longer  cause  fear. 

When  Japan  declared  war  against  Germany,  Berlin  pro- 
tested at  Peking  against  the  landing  of  troops  outside  the 
leased  zone,  and  also  against  the  seizure  by  the  Japanese 
army  of  the  German  railways  in  the  Shantung  Province. 
President  Yuan  sent  a  note  to  Japan  and  Great  Britain  in 
regard  to  the  violation  of  Chinese  neutrality;  but  he  told 
Germany  that  it  was  impossible  to  prevent  or  oppose  the 
action  of  the  Japanese  and  the  British.  The  Entente 
powers  backed  the  Japanese  contention  that  Japan  was 
acting  once  more  as  the  friend  of  China.  If  operations  had 
not  been  undertaken  against  Kiau-chau,  Germany  would 
have  used  Kiau-chau  as  a  naval  base.  The  impotence  of 
China  to  compel  respect  for  her  neutrality  led  to  disregard 
of  her  neutrality. 

After  the  expulsion  of  the  Germans  from  the  Shantung 
peninsula,  the  Japanese  installed  themselves  in  the  place 
of  the  Germans  as  they  had  done  ten  years  before  in  the 
place  of  the  Russians  in  the  Liao-tung  peninsula  and  south- 
ern Manchuria.  They  reopened  Kiau-chau  for  trade  on 
December  28.  No  Germans  were  left  in  the  interior  of  the 
peninsula.  But  the  Japanese  continued  to  occupy  mili- 
tarily the  entire  German  railroad  and  mining  concessions. 
China  reminded  Japan  of  the  promise  to  restore  Kiau-chau 
to  its  rightful  owner.  Japan  answered  that  no  promise 
had  been  given  to  China  in  this  matter,  but  that  the  restora- 
tion of  Chinese  sovereignty  was  contemplated  after  the 
war.  In  the  ultimatum  to  Germany  it  was  true  that  Japan 
had  called  upon  Germany  to  evacuate  the  lease  in  order 
that  China  might  enter  into  possession  of  her  sovereign 
rights.  But  Germany  did  not  yield  to  the  ultimatum. 
Japan  had  to  fight  to  expel  the  Germans.     The  indirect 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  GERMANY  (1914-1916)         323 

promise  in  the  ultimatum  would  have  bound  Japan  only  if 
Germany  had  turned  over  the  lease  as  a  result  of  the 
ultimatum. 

Japan  was  not  disposed  to  waste  time  in  diplomatic  nego- 
tiations with  China.  The  European  powers  were  at  war. 
The  United  States,  from  the  unbroken  experience  of  the 
past,  could  be  relied  upon  to  limit  interference  to  an  aca- 
demic protest. 

On  December  3,  1914,  the  Japanese  minister  at  Peking 
was  given  the  text  of  twenty-one  demands  for  presentation 
to  the  Chinese  government.  They  were  divided  into  five 
groups.  Minister  Hioki  was  told  that  there  was  to  be  no 
compromise  in  regard  to  the  demands  of  the  first  four 
groups.  He  was  assured,  to  quote  his  instructions,  that 
** believing  it  absolutely  essential  for  strengthening  Japan's 
position  in  eastern  Asia,  as  well  as  for  the  preservation  of 
the  general  interests  of  that  region,  to  secure  China's  ad- 
herence to  the  foregoing  proposals,  the  Imperial  Govern- 
ment are  determined  to  attain  this  end  by  all  means  within 
their  power." 

The  articles  of  the  fifth  group  were  also  to  be  presented 
as  demands,  but  could  be  modified.  The  Japanese  minister 
held  the  twenty-one  demands  up  his  sleeve  for  six  weeks, 
during  which  the  Chinese  foreign  minister  kept  protesting 
against  the  decision  of  Japan  to  maintain  a  special  military 
zone  in  Shantung  and  the  seizure  and  holding  of  the  rail- 
way traversing  the  province. 

On  January  16,  1915,  the  Chinese  government  gave  the 
Japanese  minister  a  note  pointing  out  that  ''two  months 
have  elapsed  since  the  capture  of  Tsing-tau;  the  base  of 
German  military  preparations  has  been  destroyed;  the 
troops  of  Great  Britain  have  already  been  and  those  of 
your  country  are  being  gradually  withdrawn.  This  shows 
clearly  that  there  is  no  more  military  action  in  the  special 
area.  That  the  said  area  ought  to  be  restored  to  the  con- 
trol of  the  local  authorities  admits  of  no  doubt.  .  .  .  Aa 


324         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

efforts  have  always  been  made  to  effect  an  amicable  settle- 
ment of  affairs  between  your  country  and  ours,  it  is  our 
earnest  hope  that  your  government  will  act  upon  the  prin- 
ciple of  preserving  peace  in  the  Far  East  and  maintaining 
international  confidence  and  friendship." 

In  response  the  Japanese  minister  presented  the  twenty- 
one  demands.  The  first  group  dealt  with  the  province  of 
Shantung.  China  was  asked  to  agree  in  advance  to  what- 
ever arrangements  should  be  made  between  Germany  and 
Japan  concerning  'Hhe  disposition  of  all  rights,  interests, 
and  concessions  which  Germany,  by  virtue  of  treaties  or 
otherwise,  possesses  in  relation  to  the  province  of  Shan- 
tung." Japan  claimed  recognition  of  her  inheritance  of 
German  rights  to  finance,  construct,  and  supply  materials 
for  railways  running  from  Shantung  into  Chih-li  and 
Kiang-su,  the  two  neighboring  provinces  to  north  and 
south.  Group  two  demanded  preferential  rights,  interests, 
and  privileges  for  Japan  and  Japanese  subjects  in  south 
Manchuria  and  eastern  inner  Mongolia,  most  important  of 
which  was  the  extension  to  ninety-nine  years  of  the  old 
Russian  port  and  railway  leases.  In  group  three  China 
was  asked  to  agree  to  the  exclusive  exploitation  by  Japa- 
nese capitalists  of  the  Han-Yeh-Ping  Company,  an  impor- 
tant iron-works  in  the  Yangtze  Valley.  Group  four  con- 
tained the  single  demand  of  a  formal  declaration  by  China 
that  ''no  bay,  harbor,  or  island  along  the  coast  of  China 
be  ceded  or  leased  to  any  Power. ' '  The  fifth  group  related 
to  the  employment  of  Japanese  advisers  in  political  and 
financial  and  military  affairs ;  the  purchase  from  Japan  of 
fifty  per  cent,  or  more  of  her  munitions  of  war;  railway 
rights ;  Japanese  missionary  propaganda ;  and  a  veto  power 
against  foreign  concessions  being  granted  in  the  province 
of  Fukien. 

China  called  the  world  to  witness  that  Japan  was  trying 
to  accomplish  against  her  the  very  things  the  Entente 
powers,  of  whose  alliance  Japan  was  a  member,  said  they 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  GERMANY  (1914-1916)         325 

were  fighting  to  prevent  Germany  from  doing  to  European 
neighbors.  There  was  the  usual  mild  protest  from 
America.  But  the  European  powers,  while  demurring  for 
form's  sake,  promised  Japan  secretly  that  they  would  not 
interfere  with  her  ambitions  in  China.  She  could  go  ahead 
and  treat  China  as  she  pleased,  subject  only  to  the  caution 
of  not  harming  French  and  British  interests  in  the  empire. 
Japan  was  urged  also  to  come  to  an  agreement  with  Rus- 
sia about  the  spoils. 

With  the  assurance  that  the  Entente  powers  were  behind 
her — or  that  they  would  not  oppose  her — Japan  cut  short 
China's  protests  by  an  ultimatum  delivered  on  May  7, 
1915.  It  was  modeled  on  the  Austro-Hungarian  ultimatum 
to  Serbia  of  the  previous  year.  If  China  did  not  yield  to 
all  the  demands  of  the  first  four  groups  and  the  Fukien 
demand  of  the  fifth  group  in  forty-eight  hours,  Japan 
would  use  force.  The  other  demands  of  the  fifth  group 
were  not  insisted  upon  because  some  of  them  infringed 
upon  the  real  or  fancied  privileges  of  Japan's  allies  in 
other  parts  of  China.  Before  these  screws  were  tightened, 
further  negotiation  was  required  with  Great  Britain  and 
France  and  Russia.  Again  the  United  States  sent  a  note. 
China,  with  no  backing  any^^here  in  the  world,  had  to 
accept  the  demands  of  Japan  or  enter  into  war.  On  May 
25  a  series  of  notes  dictated  by  the  Japanese  minister  at 
Peking  and  signed  by  the  Chinese  minister  of  foreign  af- 
fairs gave  Japan  control  of  Shantung  and  put  China  in 
the  hands  of  her  island  neighbor. 

To  show  the  danger  of  secret  diplomacy  to  the  mainte- 
nance of  good  faith  in  international  relations,  we  have  no 
more  convincing  example  than  the  negotiations  between 
Japan  and  Russia  in  the  summer  of  1916.  At  the  sugges- 
tion of  the  French  and  the  British,  who  were  nervous  about 
the  pro-German  influence  at  Petrograd  and  wanted  to  do 
everything  they  could  to  propitiate  the  Russian  Foreign 
Office,  Japan  came  to  an  understanding  with  Russia.     A 


326  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

treaty  was  signed  at  the  beginning  of  July,  1916,  which 
was  given  out  to  the  press.    It  read  as  follows : 

*'The  Imperial  Government  of  Japan  and  the  Imperial 
Government  of  Russia,  resolved  to  unite  their  efforts  to 
the  maintenance  of  lasting  peace  in  the  Far  East,  have 
agreed  upon  the  following: 

''Article  One:  Japan  will  not  be  a  party  to  any  poHti- 
cal  arrangement  or  combination  directed  against  Russia. 
Russia  will  not  be  a  party  to  any  political  arrangement  or 
combination  directed  against  Japan. 

''Article  Two:  Should  the  territorial  rights  or  the  spe- 
cial interests  in  the  Far  East  of  one  of  the  contracting 
parties  recognized  by  the  other  contracting  party  be 
threatened,  Japan  and  Russia  will  take  counsel  of  each 
other  as  to  the  measures  to  be  taken  to  provide  for  the  sup- 
port or  the  help  to  be  given  in  order  to  safeguard  and  de- 
fend those  rights  and  interests." 

The  British  press  considered  the  agreement  highly  sat- 
isfactory; and  it  was  pointed  out  by  the  government  in 
Parliament  that  Japan  was  not  only  acting  fairly  toward 
China  and  living  up  to  the  terms  of  the  Anglo-Japanese 
treaty,  but  was  also  doing  all  she  could  to  knit  more  closely 
the  bonds  uniting  the  powers  at  war  with  Germany. 

But  after  the  Russian  Revolution  the  archives  of  the 
Russian  Foreign  Office  were  published.  A  secret  treaty, 
signed  on  July  3,  1916,  was  discovered.  By  its  terms  Rus- 
sia and  Japan  bound  themselves  mutually  to  safeguard 
China  ' '  against  the  political  domination  of  any  third  Power 
entertaining  hostile  designs  against  Russia  or  Japan."  It 
was  an  offensive  and  defensive  alliance,  operating  from 
the  moment ' '  any  third  power ' '  should  attack  either  Russia 
or  Japan  in  their  vested  positions  on  Chinese  territory. 
This  treaty  was  a  violation  of  the  Anglo-Russian  conven- 
tion of  1907  and  of  Article  Three  of  the  Anglo-Japanese 
treaty  of  alliance  of  July  13,  1911.  As  the  contracting 
parties  agreed  that  "the  present  convention  shall  be  kept 
in  complete  secrecy  from  everybody,"  this  evidence  of  bad 


JAPAN'S  WAR  WITH  GERMANY  (1914-1916)        327 

faith  might  never  have  come  to  light  had  it  not  been  for 
the  publication  of  the  Russian  archives.* 

Without  the  knowledge  of  China,  the  Entente  powers 
gave  secret  assurances  (written  except  in  the  case  of  Italy) 
that  when  it  came  to  signing  peace  with  Germany,  Japan 
should  have  the  Shantung  peninsula  and  the  German 
islands  north  of  the  equator.  These  negotiations  were  car- 
ried on  and  terminated  at  the  moment  the  United  States 
was  getting  ready  to  enter  the  World  War  and  to  bring 
China  with  her  to  the  aid  of  the  Allies.  The  dates  of  the 
secret  agreements  are  significant.  They  were  signed  be- 
tween the  time  America  broke  off  diplomatic  relations  with 
Germany  and  the  date  when  she  declared  war.  There  was 
need  for  haste.  The  Russian  promise  to  Japan  was  given 
on  February  20,  following  the  British  promise  of  February 
16.  France's  obligation  to  support  Japan  against  China 
was  signed  on  March  1.  On  March  28  the  Italian  minister 
of  foreign  affairs  stated  orally  that  ''the  Italian  govern- 
ment had  no  objection  regarding  the  matter."  The  En- 
tente powers  wanted  to  be  able,  when  the  peace  conference 
assembled,  to  show  the  United  States  arrangements  con- 
cluded before  she  became  a  belligerent. 

'  The  archives  of  the  ministry  of  foreign  affairs  were  published  by  the 
soviet  government  from  December,  1917,  to  March,  1918,  in  the  Petrograd 
Izvestia;  but  Entente  cable  and  newspaper  censorship  prevented  the  republica- 
tion in  Entente  countries  during  the  war. 


CHAPTER   XXIX 

THE    UNITED   STATES    IN   WORLD    POLITICS    (1893-1917) 

ON  May  1,  1893,  the  World's  Columbian  Exposition 
was  opened  at  Chicago.  The  three  caravels  of  Co- 
lumbus, reproduced  from  ancient  wood-cuts,  bore  witness 
to  the  small  way  in  which  Europe  first  became  interested 
in  the  western  hemisphere.  To  the  millions  of  Americans 
who  saw  them,  the  caravels  were  symbolic  of  the  miracles 
that  had  been  accomplished  in  four  hundred  years.  But 
to  European  visitors  they  signified  the  beginning  of  a 
movement  of  population  from  Europe  which  had  not  been 
to  the  profit  of  Europe.  The  developers  of  Caucasian 
civilization  in  the  two  American  continents  had  cut  loose 
from  Europe  politically  and  economically,  had  become  self- 
sustaining,  and  were  using  the  Old  World  merely  as  a 
source  of  man  power  and  capital. 

Since  the  end  of  the  Napoleonic  era  the  new  nations  of 
the  American  continents  had  gradually  become  isolated. 
European  political  systems  were  no  longer  able  to  influence 
the  destinies  of  America  and  to  create  and  develop  mar- 
kets through  the  imposition  and  maintenance  of  overlord- 
ship.  The  great  colonizing  powers  turned  elsewhere. 
Spain  and  Portugal  were  falling  into  decay.  Holland  had 
all  she  could  do  in  managing  the  East  Indies.  France  be- 
gan to  colonize  Africa.  Great  Britain,  while  her  activities 
were  world-wide,  devoted  her  energies  to  Africa  and  Asia 
and  allowed  her  colonists  in  America  and  other  regions  of 
the  temperate  zone  to  develop  their  own  institutions  ac- 
cording to  their  own  interests  with  a  degree  of  freedom 
that  has  come  to  mean  virtual  independence. 

The  Chicago  exposition  was  a  world's  fair  in  name  only. 

328 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS  (1893-1917)   329 

Although  we  asked  the  world  to  celebrate  with  us,  the 
invitation  was  really  given  for  the  purpose  of  demonstrat- 
ing our  self-sufficiency.  We  were  not  seeking  political  alli- 
ances or  economic  understandings;  we  had  no  surplus  of 
food  products  or  manufactured  articles  for  which  to  find 
markets ;  and  American  capital  was  not  looking  for  invest- 
ment abroad. 

International  fairs  in  European  cities  had  political  and 
economic  aims  to  attain ;  but  we  did  not  think  of  our  coun- 
try as  a  partner  in  an  organization  known  as  the  world,  in 
which  each  member  was  dependent  on  the  others,  or  at  least 
affected  in  its  security  and  prosperity  by  what  affected  the 
other  members.  Wliat  the  European  nations  did  in  their 
own  continent  was  no  concern  of  ours,  and  we  had  not 
joined  them  in  or  made  any  effort  to  prevent  them  from 
exploiting  Asia  and  Africa. 

We  did  not  reaUze  that  we  were  on  the  threshold  of  a 
new  era  and  that  the  quarter  of  a  century  following  the 
Columbian  Exposition  was  to  mark  the  end  of  our  isola- 
tion, to  thrust  upon  us  colonial  responsibilities,  to  involve 
us  inextricably  in  the  politics  of  the  Far  East,  and  to  make 
us  aware  of  the  vital  relation  between  our  prosperity  and 
security  on  the  one  hand  and  the  problems  of  the  European 
balance  of  power  and  the  extension  of  European  eminent 
domain  on  the  other.  We  were  to  become  a  world  power, 
not  by  accident,  but  because  of  the  working  out  in  our  case 
of  the  economic  laws  that  were  already  operative  in 
Europe. 

During  the  thirty  years  following  the  Civil  War  the  peo- 
ple of  the  United  States  still  had  within  the  limits  of  their 
own  country  opportunities  for  industrial  and  agricultural 
expansion,  for  colonization,  for  opening  up  new  regions, 
and  for  the  employment  of  capital,  sufficient  to  absorb  the 
energies  of  a  rapidly  growing  nation.  Despite  a  healthy 
increase  in  the  native  born,  and  an  immigration  that  finally 
reached  a  million  in  one  year,  our  capacity  for  consumption 


330         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

kept  pace  with  our  capacity  for  production.  We  did  not 
have  to  think  of  overseas  markets,  of  colonizing  areas,  of 
mercantile  marine,  of  holders  of  foreign  bonds,  of  jobs  on 
the  pay-roll  of  weak  states  for  men  who  could  not  or  would 
not  find  work  at  home ;  we  did  not  have  to  worry  over  the 
aggressive  colonial  policies  of  rival  nations ;  and,  having  no 
potential  enemies  on  our  own  continent  and  no  colonies  to 
defend  and  no  goods  to  sell  or  loans  to  make  to  inferior 
peoples,  we  did  not  have  to  keep  up  a  large  army  and  navy. 
Although  our  national  wealth  had  become  half  again  as 
large,  and  our  population  twice  as  large,  as  that  of  Great 
Britain,  our  national  debt  was  about  one  fifth  of  the  British 
debt.  We  had  spent  and  were  spending  nothing  on  account 
of  world  politics. 

When  the  United  States  began  to  have  an  excess  of  pro- 
duction over  consumption,  and  when  American  capital  be- 
came interested  in  foreign  enterprises,  we  w^ere  made  to 
realize  how  slight  was  the  influence  of  the  United  States 
in  world  affairs.  We  had  no  colonial  possessions,  even  in 
America,  except  Alaska,  and  no  naval  bases  in  the  waters 
of  our  own  continent.  Aside  from  an  interest  in  Samoa 
and  an  undefined  connection  with  Hawaii,  we  had  staked 
out  no  claims  in  the  Pacific,  and  we  were  altogether  with- 
out footholds  in  Asia  and  in  Africa.  The  European  nations 
were  active  all  over  the  world.  In  our  own  neighborhood. 
Great  Britain,  Spain,  France,  Denmark,  and  Holland  were 
installed  along  the  route  to  South  America  and  guarded 
the  Atlantic  approach  of  the  canal  that  was  planned  to 
join  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific.  In  the  closing  years  of  the 
nineteenth  century  we  awoke  slightly  to  the  reahzation  of 
the  disadvantage  of  our  international  position,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  strategic  and  economic  needs.  But,  as 
long  as  we  did  not  actually  feel  the  menace  of  any  other 
nation  or  the  effect  on  our  pocket-books  of  having  no  for- 
eign policy,  public  opinion  remained  satisfied  with  isolation 
and  was  lethargic  in  the  face  of  world  changes  and  crises. 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS   (1893-1917)   331 

The  evolution  of  the  United  States  from  a  self-sufficing 
and  self-absorbed  political  organism  on  the  North  Ameri- 
can continent  into  a  world  power  has  not  yet  been  com- 
pleted. Notwithstanding  our  participation  in  the  World 
War  and  in  the  international  conferences  of  the  victorious 
powers,  there  is  still  a  strong  sentiment  against  ''foreign 
entanglements,"  and  three  and  a  half  years  of  negotiations 
have  not  yet  succeeded  in  committing  us  to  the  support 
of  joint  policies,  regional  or  general,  for  the  ordering  of 
world  affairs.  But  that  we  shall  become  a  world  power  in 
the  fullest  implication  of  that  term  has  been  certain  since 
April  6,  1917,  when  we  declared  war  upon  Germany,  as  it 
was  inevitable  from  the  day  of  our  treaty  with  Spain. 

The  story  of  the  United  States  in  world  politics  from 
1893  to  1917  falls  under  five  heads:  (1)  acquisitions;  (2) 
assertion  of  the  doctrine  of  the  open  door;  (3)  effort  to 
build  up  a  merchant  marine;  (4)  construction  of  a  navy 
''second  to  none";  and  (5)  intervention  in  other  countries. 

At  the  Chicago  exposition  there  were  no  pavilions  hous- 
ing the  exhibits  of  American  possessions  or  dependencies. 
All  our  acquisitions  have  come  since  1893  by  treaty,  com- 
promise, conquest,  and  purchase.  In  1898  we  acquired  by 
annexation  the  Hawaiian  Islands,  and  by  conquest  Porto 
Rico,  the  Philippines,  and  Guam ;  in  1899,  by  a  compromise 
arranged  with  Germany,  the  eastern  portion  of  the  Samoan 
Islands,  where  we  had  already  established  a  naval  base  in 
the  harbor  of  Pagopago ;  ^  in  1903,  by  purchase  from 
Panama,  the  canal  zone,  together  with  five  islands  in 
Panama  Bay,  and  by  a  lease  from  Cuba  coaling  and  naval 
stations  at  Guantanamo  and  Bahia  Honda;  in  1914,  by 
lease  from  Nicaragua,  the  Corn  Islands  and  a  naval  base  on 

*  Pagopago,  on  the  island  of  Tutuila,  was  ceded  to  the  United  States  for  a 
naval  and  coaling  station  in  1872.  The  Samoan  Islands  were  made  neutral, 
■with  judicial  extraterritoriality  for  foreigners,  by  the  treaty  of  June  14,  1889, 
signed  by  the  United  States,  Germany,  and  Great  Britain.  On  November  14, 
1899,  a  second  treaty  of  the  three  powers  divided  the  islands  between  the 
United  States  and  Germany,  Great  Britain  receiving  compensation  from 
Germany  elsewhere. 


332  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  mainland ;  and  in  1916,  by  purchase  from  Denmark,  her 
islands  in  the  West  Indies,  which  have  been  renamed  by 
us  the  Virgin  Islands. 

With  the  exception  of  the  Philippine  Islands  and  Guam, 
these  acquisitions  had  been  frequently  proposed,  but  had 
not  previously  materialized,  in  most  instances  because  of 
the  opposition  of  the  Senate.  The  archives  of  the  State 
Department,  presidential  messages,  and  congressional  de- 
bates, between  1840  and  1876,  contain  frequent  references 
to  treaties,  projects  of  treaties,  and  reports  of  negotiations 
concerning  Samoa,  Hawaii,  Panama,  Nicaragua,  and  the 
Spanish  and  Danish  West  Indies.  Besides  these  ^'foreign 
parts ' '  which  eventually  came  under  American  sovereignty, 
the  United  States  did  not  avail  itself  of  opportunities  to 
annex  Salvador,  Cuba,  Yucatan,  the  Dominican  Republic, 
and  other  small  countries  that  at  one  time  or  another  were 
not  unwilling  to  surrender  their  sovereignty  to  us.  Not 
until  our  Pacific  states  had  become  large  and  prosperous 
and  Japan  began  to  loom  as  a  great  power  did  we  embark 
upon  a  policy  of  acquiring  islands  and  coaling  stations. 
For  not  until  then  did  we  realize  the  necessity  of  cutting 
the  canal  we  had  been  talking  about  for  half  a  century  and 
of  protecting  its  approaches  and  our  trade  routes  to  Asia. 

The  war  with  Spain,  in  1898,  not  only  gave  us  a  place  in 
the  West  Indies  and  in  the  eastern  Pacific,  but  it  thrust  us 
into  the  Far  East  at  a  critical  moment  in  the  relations 
between  China  and  the  powers;  it  demonstrated  the  dis- 
advantages of  our  lack  of  a  merchant  marine  and  our  small 
navy;  and  it  involved  us  in  intervention  in  China,  Cuba, 
Panama,  and  elsewhere. 

The  opportunity  to  reaffirm  a  traditional  principle  of 
American  foreign  policy  came  to  Secretary  Hay  shortly 
after  the  acquisition  of  the  Philippines.  In  a  note  to  the 
powers  on  September  6, 1899,  he  proposed  equality  of  trade 
opportunity  in  China  for  all  nations.  **The  principle  of 
equal  and  impartial  trade  with  all  parts  of  the  Chinese 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS  (1893-1917)   333 

Empire"  was  reiterated  on  July  3,  1900.^  In  the  summer 
of  1903  the  consent  of  China  was  secured  to  the  opening 
of  ports  in  Manchuria.  In  May  and  December,  1909,  Sec- 
retary Knox  attempted  once  more  to  maintain  the  open 
door  in  Manchuria.  In  1906  the  American  delegates  to  the 
conference  of  Algeciras  signed  the  treaty  guaranteeing 
Morocco,  with  the  reservation  that  the  United  States 
assumed  no  obligation  or  responsibility  for  its  enforcement, 
and  had  had  ''no  desire  or  purpose  in  taking  part  in  the 
conference  other  than  to  secure  for  all  peoples  the  widest 
equality  of  trade  and  privileges  in  Morocco."  Our  par- 
ticipation in  the  Chinese  and  Moroccan  questions,  without 
any  direct  interest  to  defend  or  advance,  demonstrates  that 
the  United  States  was  beginning  to  feel,  like  Germany,  that 
it  was  a  vital  function  of  foreign  policy  to  insist  that  the 
door  to  trade  on  equal  footing  be  not  closed  by  further 
extension  of  European  eminent  domain  in  any  part  of  the 
world. 

During  the  period  of  the  Napoleonic  wars,  despite  our 
losses  as  neutrals  and  as  belligerents  in  the  "War  of  1812, 
the  American  merchant  marine  increased  its  sea-going  ton- 
nage sevenfold,  and  in  twenty  years  ships  under  American 
registry  gradually  took  over  trans-Atlantic  trade  until  from 
less  than  twenty-five  per  cent,  the  proportion  of  tonnage 
carried  in  American  bottoms  increased  to  ninety  per  cent. 
From  1815  to  1840  the  United  States  could  not  only  build 
but  operate  ships  more  cheaply  than  any  European  nation, 
and  she  therefore  gradually  outclassed  British  and  all  other 
operators  of  sailing-vessels.  The  American  merchant  ma- 
rine suffered  a  temporary  setback  by  the  introduction  of 
steam-driven  vessels  between  1840  and  1850,  but  at  the 
outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  our  steam  fleet  was  nearly  as 
large  as  that  of  Great  Britain  and  was  admittedly  more 
efl&cient. 

The  decade  of  the  Civil  War  proved  disastrous  to  the 

'See  p.  144. 


334         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

American  merchant  marine.  During  four  years  of  hos- 
tilities the  demands  of  war  on  ships  and  on  both  seamen 
and  landsmen  destroyed  a  large  part  of  the  shipping  and 
diverted  its  personnel  to  other  activities.  Had  our  na- 
tional prosperity  remained  even  in  a  limited  measure  de- 
pendent upon  the  carrying  trade,  the  merchant  marine 
would  have  rivaled  Great  Britain's  again  within  ten  years. 
But  after  the  war  our  energies  were  devoted  to  railway- 
building  and  to  the  development  of  the  middle  west  and 
the  Pacific  coast.  The  vast  interior  of  the  American  con- 
tinent was  opened  up,  and  capital  and  labor  found  other 
channels  of  productive  effort  to  replace  what  the  carrying 
trade  had  brought  them.  Another  factor  in  the  failure  to 
rehabilitate  our  shipping  was  the  absence  of  coal  and  iron 
at  tide-water. 

As  long  as  the  nation  did  not  feel  dependent  upon 
American-controlled  shipping  for  prosperity  and  security, 
pride  in  the  American  flag  and  the  halo  of  tradition  did 
not  revive  the  shipping  industry.  The  granting  of  sub- 
sidies, the  means  used  by  the  European  nations  for  develop- 
ing their  merchant  marine,  has  always  been  opposed  by 
American  public  sentiment,  and  maritime  legislation  at 
Washington  has  hindered  rather  than  encouraged  the 
renascence  of  our  international  carrying  trade.  By  the 
exclusion  of  ships  of  foreign  registry  from  carrying  freight 
or  passengers  between  American  ports,  our  coastwise  trade 
was  saved  from  the  paralyzing  effect  of  laws  that  made 
operation  much  more  costly  for  American  ship-owners  than 
for  those  of  any  other  nation.  But  in  international  trade, 
where  there  was  competition,  there  was  no  hope  for  ships 
of  American  registry. 

After  the  outbreak  of  the  World  War  our  export  trade, 
which  had  never  before  been  important  enough  to  make 
serious  aid  to  the  growth  of  American  shipping  seem  worth 
while,  developed  rapidly,  and  within  two  years  the  Ameri- 
can people  began  to  see  the  disadvantage  of  dependence 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS  (1893-1917)   335 

upon  foreign  vessels.  The  nations  that  had  furnished  most 
of  our  shipping  were  using  their  ships  for  war  purposes, 
and  they  had  available  only  sufficient  tonnage  to  carry  what 
products  of  ours  they  needed  for  military  purposes.  In 
the  meantime  their  own  export  trade  had  diminished,  and 
the  opportunities  were  unlimited  for  American  products  to 
get  in  on  the  ground  floor  in  every  country  outside  Europe. 
But  we  did  not  have  shipping  that  could  be  controlled  for 
the  purpose  of  promoting  our  own  interests.  This  awaken- 
ing led  to  the  passage  of  a  shipping  act  on  September  7, 
1916,  for  the  promotion  and  development  of  the  American 
merchant  marine.  A  shipping  board  w^as  created  to  con- 
struct ships,  with  fifty  million  dollars  of  capital,  to  be 
derived  from  the  sale  of  Panama  Canal  bonds  not  yet 
put  on  the  market  by  the  United  States  treasury.  The 
board  had  hardly  been  organized  when  our  entry  into 
the  war  led  Congress  to  consent  to  unlimited  expenditure 
for  the  purpose  of  the  rapid  construction  of  merchant- 
ships. 

The  American  navy  acquitted  itself  with  great  credit  in 
the  Spanish-American  War;  but  public  opinion  realized 
that  it  was  the  weakness  of  the  Spaniards  rather  than  the 
strength  of  the  Americans  that  gave  us  the  victory.  Our 
fleet  was  divided,  and  there  was  no  way  to  pass  from  one 
ocean  to  the  other.  To  reinforce  the  Atlantic  fleet  the 
battleship  Oregon  had  steamed  all  the  way  around  Cape 
Horn.  Dewey's  fleet  was  in  the  Philippines.  Our  Pacific 
coast  was  without  protection.  Had  Germany  or  France 
joined  Spain  the  situation  would  have  been  serious.  It 
soon  became  known  that  we  had  actually  been  dependent 
upon  the  good-will  of  Great  Britain,  which  was  fortunately 
manifested  on  our  side  in  at  least  one  crisis  of  the  war. 
The  experience  of  1898  led  the  American  people  to  deter- 
mine that  the  canal  connecting  the  two  oceans  must  be  cut 
at  the  earliest  possible  moment,  and  that  the  naval  budget 
must  be  increased  to  provide  for  the  building  of  ships  suf- 


336         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ficient  in  number  and  armament  to  protect  both  coasts  in 
the  event  of  war. 

Immediately  after  the  Spanish-American  War  other  fac- 
tors came  in  to  influence  the  United  States  to  construct  a 
large  fleet.  Great  Britain  and  Germany  adopted  ambitious 
naval  programs.  Russia  was  building  two  fleets  with 
French  money.  Japan  was  beginning  to  loom  up  as  a 
strong  naval  power  in  the  Pacific.  We  had  annexed  Hawaii 
and  Porto  Rico ;  we  had  assumed  responsibility  for  Cuba ; 
and  the  extensive  Philippine  archipelago,  a  fortnight's  sail- 
ing distance  from  our  nearest  Pacific  naval  base,  was  ours 
for  better  or  for  worse.  We  had  scarcely  begun  building 
our  new  navy  when  the  victories  of  Japan  over  Russia 
proved  that  the  Japanese  could  not  be  ignored.  If  we  were 
to  hold  the  Philippines  and  Hawaii  we  must  be  able  to 
defend  them.  The  Panama  Canal  and  the  West  Indies 
entailed  responsibilities  in  event  of  a  European  war,  no 
matter  how  the  powers  were  ahned.  When  the  World  War 
finally  broke  out  we  were  probably  more  impotent  to 
enforce  our  neutral  rights  on  the  high  seas  than  we  had 
been  a  hundred  years  before.  Great  Britain  interfered 
with  our  trade ;  Germany  began  a  submarine  warfare  and 
threatened  to  sink  our  shipping  without  warning.  After 
the  battle  of  Jutland  the  United  States  decided  to  build  a 
fleet  '^ second  to  none."  Supremacy  of  the  sea  was  not 
aimed  at,  but  we  determined  to  have  equality  of  sea  power 
with  the  strongest  naval  power.  In  July,  1916,  Congress 
adopted  a  naval  program  providing  for  the  immediate  con- 
struction of  eight  new  capital  ships  and  a  large  number  of 
minor  craft,  at  a  cost  that  the  representatives  of  the  people 
would  not  have  dared  to  sanction  a  few  years  earlier.  It 
was  a  logical,  an  inevitable,  step.  The  possession  of  the 
Philippines  involved  us  in  the  Far  East.  Our  foreign  trade 
was  becoming  precious  to  us,  and  we  were  dreaming  of  a 
merchant  marine. 

Up  to  1898,  the  policy  of  abstaining  from  intervention  in 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS   (1893-1917)   337 

internal  political  affairs  of  other  countries  had  always  had 
the  support  of  American  public  opinion  and  had  been  scru- 
pulously followed,  with  the  single  exception  of  the  quarrel 
between  Mexico  and  Texas.^  Opportunities  and  occasions 
for  intervention  had  been  frequent,  especially  in  Latin 
America,  and  there  were  times  when  European  nations  in- 
timated to  us  that  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  which  denied  it  to 
them,  imposed  upon  us  the  obligation  of  intervention.  But 
we  interpreted  the  Monroe  Doctrine  in  a  negative  sense, 
and  stood  steadfastly  for  non-intervention.^  The  cry  for 
aid  came  even  from  oppressed  peoples  in  Europe,  and 
plausible  arguments  were  advanced  to  the  effect  that  the 
boon  of  liberty  we  enjoyed  ought  to  make  us  willing  to 
help  others  secure  it,  notably  in  the  case  of  Hungary,  when 
Kossuth  visited  the  United  States.  The  three  considera- 
tions that  kept  us  out  of  the  French  Eevolution,  however, 
invariably  prevailed :  that  every  nation  had  a  right  to  work 
out  its  own  salvation,  irrespective  of  its  size,  religious 
beliefs,  or  political  conceptions;  that  any  intervention 
would  involve  us  in  Old  World  politics  and  political 
methods  and  systems ;  and  that  our  national  interests  would 
be  best  served  by  minding  our  own  business.  Consequently 
intervention  in  Cuba,  which  led  to  the  Spanish-American 
War,  denoted  an  epoch-making  abandonment  of  traditional 
policy. 

We  could  not  claim  that  the  motive  for  intervention  was 
solely  to  free  the  Cubans  from  the  yoke  of  Spain ;  Spanish 
misrule  and  oppression  had  been  known  to  us  for  many 
years  and  at  several  times  had  reached  as  bad  a  state  as 
during  the  period  preceding  the  war  of  1898.  But  the 
changing  conditions  in  the  relations  of  the  United  States 
with  the  rest  of  the  world  made  us  beUeve  that  a  free  and 

^  The  Mexican  War  was  bitterly  opposed  by  prominent  Americans  (witness 
the  speeches  in  Congress  and  Lowell's  "Biglow  Papers"),  and,  despite  its 
benefits,  has  not  been  regarded  as  a  creditable  exploit  by  American  historians. 

'  For  a  discussion  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  and  our  relations  during  this 
period  with  Latin-American  peoples,  see  Chapter  XXX. 


338         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tranquil  Cuba  was  essential  to  our  national  security  and 
prosperity.  We  promised  not  to  annex  Cuba,  and  we  did 
not  do  so.  But  Cuban  independence  was  established  only 
with  the  stipulation  that  the  United  States  should  have  the 
right  to  intervene  at  any  time  Washington  believed  inter- 
vention was  necessary  to  defend  Cuba  against  foreign 
aggression  or  to  straighten  out  her  internal  political  and 
economic  affairs.  It  was  a  veiled  protectorate,  confirmed 
by  the  lease  of  two  naval  bases  and  the  annexation  of 
Porto  Rico. 

As  a  result  of  the  Spanish-American  War  the  United 
States  became  involved  in  Porto  Rico  and  the  Philippine 
Islands.  We  did  not  think  it  was  to  our  interest — or  to 
theirs — to  give  the  peoples  of  these  islands  independence. 
Nor  did  we  grant  them  American  citizenship.^  Our  rela- 
tions with  them,  owing  to  the  lack  of  a  constitutional  pro- 
vision to  cover  colonies  or  protectorates,  has  been  anoma- 
lous ever  since,  and  the  United  States  has  been  led  into 
methods  of  colonial  administration  and  into  military  under- 
takings contrary  to  the  ideals  of  self-determination  of  peo- 
ples that  had  been  advocated  up  to  that  time  by  American 
public  opinion.^ 

The  policy  of  non-intervention  has  not  since  been  rees- 
tablished, for  the  assuming  of  one  obligation  led  us  on  to 

^  A  limited  form  of  responsible  government  was  granted  to  the  Filipinos  by 
the  act  of  1916  in  which  Congress  promised  also  ultimate  independence.  The 
Porto  Ricans  were  made  American  citizens  and  granted  representative  govern- 
ment by  the  act  of  1917.  Porto  Eico  is  definitely  incorporated  in  the  United 
States.  There  is  difference  of  opinion  in  both  Republican  and  Democratic 
parties  as  to  the  political  status  of  the  Philippine  Islands,  and  as  to  what 
sliould  be  the  permanent  future  relations,  if  any,  between  the  archipelago  and 
the  United  States,  although  only  Democratic  platforms  have  advocated 
autonomy  or  independence  for  the  Filipinos. 

^  There  was  not  at  any  time,  however,  a  feeling  that  we  should  go  to  war 
to  assert  this  right,  until  the  Cuban  propaganda  swept  the  country  prior  to 
the  Spanish-American  War.  Even  then,  helping  others  to  win  their  freedom 
was  a  justifica~tion  rather  than  a  cause  for  war.  Our  sympathy  with  subject 
peoples  was  platonic,  even  though  expressed  with  much  effervescence.  We 
had  sympathized  with  Kossuth  in  Hungary,  Emmet  in  Ireland,  Garibaldi  in 
Italy,  and  the  Poles  in  1830  and  1863.  Jane  Porter's  "Thaddeus  of  Warsaw" 
and  William  Ware's  "Toussaint  Louverture"  were  favorite  classics  of 
American  childhood,  because  they  breathed  the  spirit  of  our  Declaration  of 
Independence. 


UNITED  STATES  IN  WORLD  POLITICS  (1893-1917)   339 

others.  In  1900  we  participated  in  the  intervention  of  the 
powers  in  China,  and  American  troops  have  been  stationed 
in  China  for  more  than  twenty  years.  In  1903  we  inter- 
vened in  the  insurrection  of  the  province  of  Panama  against 
Colombia  and  prevented  the  Colombian  troops  from  attack- 
ing the  rebels.  We  have  been  on  the  Isthmus  of  Panama 
ever  since.  In  1905  we  began  to  intervene  in  Santo  Do- 
mingo, and  during  the  World  War  took  over  the  govern- 
ment of  Santo  Domingo  and  Haiti.  In  1912  American 
marines  were  landed  in  Nicaragua,  and  detachments  oc- 
cupied the  capital.  In  1913  and  1916  American  naval  and 
military  forces  intervened  in  Mexico. 

As  in  Cuba,  the  chain  of  events  or  specific  incidents  that 
brought  about  intervention  in  these  various  countries  were 
not  markedly  different  from  events  or  incidents  that  had 
occurred  over  and  over  again  during  the  first  century  of 
American  history.  But  European  and  American  invest- 
ments had  increased  very  greatly  in  the  West  Indies,  Cen- 
tral America,  and  China.  There  were  concession-holders 
and  bondholders  to  be  protected,  and  considerable  trade 
interests  at  stake.  As  long  as  these  had  been  negligible  our 
State  Department  avoided  intervention.  But  non-interven- 
tion is  not  possible  in  the  diplomacy  of  a  world  power. 
When  we  became  a  world  power,  therefore,  we  began  to 
intervene  where  our  interests  lay,  and  public  opinion,  con- 
scious of  these  interests,  approved  what  it  had  formerly 
condemned  when  other  nations  had  done  the  same  thing. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

THE   UNITED   STATES   AND    THE    LATIN-AMEKICAN   EEPT7BLICS 

(1893-1917) 

THE  first  effort  of  the  United  States  to  bring  together 
the  nations  of  the  New  World  that  they  might  talk 
over  their  common  interests  was  made  by  Secretary  Blaine 
in  1881,  when  the  independent  countries  of  North  and  South 
America  were  invited  to  participate  in  a  general  conference 
in  Washington  "for  the  purpose  of  considering  and  dis- 
cussing the  methods  of  preventing  war  between  the  nations 
of  America."  But  Chile  and  Peru,  then  in  the  midst  of  a 
bitter  war,  were  not  disposed  to  accept  this  opportunity  for 
pan-American  arbitration,  and  all  the  invitations  were  with- 
drawn. Eight  years  later,  when  Mr.  Blaine  was  again  sec- 
retary of  state,  he  had  the  honor  of  presiding  over  the 
opening  session  of  the  first  Pan-American  Conference. 
Except  for  the  establishment  of  the  Bureau  of  American 
Republics  in  Washington,  little  was  accomplished  in  form- 
ulating common  American  policies.  The  Latin  republics 
were  jealous  and  suspicious  of  the  United  States  and  com- 
bined to  defeat  even  the  most  harmless  proposals.  That 
bad  feeling  had  been  aroused  by  the  conference  was  dem- 
onstrated shortly  afterward,  when  our  vigorous  represen- 
tations to  Chile,  because  of  the  killing  of  American  sailors 
at  Valparaiso,  were  resented  throughout  South  and  Central 
America.  We  were  accused  of  having  tried  to  intervene 
in  a  domestic  quarrel. 

It  was  twelve  years  before  the  second  conference  as- 
sembled in  Mexico  City  to  arrange  the  conditions  under 
which  all  American  countries  were  to  become  signatories 
of  the  Hague  convention  of  1899.     The  third  conference, 

340 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)     341 

in  Rio  de  Janeiro  in  1906,  was  called  together  principally 
to  deliberate  upon  participation  in  the  second  Hague  con- 
vention. At  Buenos  Aires,  in  1910,  the  scope  of  the  Wash- 
ington bureau  was  enlarged  and  its  name  was  changed  to 
the  Pan-American  Bureau.  The  fifth  conference  was  to 
have  been  held  in  Santiago,  Chile,  in  1914,  but  was  post- 
poned on  account  of  the  war. 

Until  the  United  States  began  to  be  interested  in  an 
Atlantic-Pacific  canal,  due  to  the  rapid  development  of  the 
far  west,  and  the  government  became  nervous  over  the  pos- 
sibility of  a  fresh  attempt  to  extend  the  working  of  Euro- 
pean economic  imperialism  to  America,  virtually  nothing 
was  done,  ofl&cially  or  privately,  to  take  advantage  of  our 
propinquity  to  the  Latin-American  states.  We  had  no 
direct  steamship  or  cable  communications  with  South 
America,  and  connections  with  the  West  Indies  and  Cen- 
tral America  only  by  fruit  and  tourist  steamers.  American 
banks  did  not  function  in  Latin  America,  whose  countries 
found  the  capital  for  railway  and  port  development  and 
equipment  and  for  commercial  and  mining  enterprises  in 
European  markets.  Our  trade  with  South  America  was 
negligible.  Engrossed  in  our  own  affairs,  we  paid  hardly 
more  attention  to  the  rest  of  America  than  to  Africa  and 
Asia. 

In  1895  a  sudden  change  came  when  President  Cleveland 
declared  that  the  Monroe  Doctrine  was  a  vital  American 
policy  and  that  the  people  of  the  United  States  would 
enforce  it.  Great  Britain  had  been  carrying  on  a  boundary 
dispute  with  Venezuela  for  half  a  century.  It  had  never 
been  settled  because  the  British  Foreign  Office  insisted  on 
the  outright  surrender  of  most  of  the  territory  before  a 
joint  boundary  commission  was  formed.  The  issue  in  itself 
was  not  an  important  one,  and  there  was  no  reason  to  be- 
lieve that  the  British  had  a  bad  case.  But  the  revival  of 
British  imperialism,  which  other  nations  were  imitating, 
seemed  to  necessitate  strong  action  on  the  part  of   the 


342  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

United  States,  unless  we  were  prepared  to  allow  the  Euro- 
pean nations  to  deal  with  Latin-Americans  as  they  dealt 
with  Asiatic  and  African  peoples.  For  the  sake  of  making 
a  test,  President  Cleveland  requested  Great  Britain  to 
arbitrate  her  difference  with  Venezuela,  basing  his  inter- 
vention upon  the  Monroe  Doctrine.  On  November  26,  1895, 
Great  Britain  replied,  rejecting  our  assumption  that  the 
Monroe  Doctrine  had  any  international  significance  and 
especially  repudiating  the  principle  that  *' American  ques- 
tions are  for  American  discussion";  on  these  grounds  she 
refused  to  arbitrate. 

On  December  17  the  president  submitted  the  correspon- 
dence to  Congress,  recommending  the  sending  of  a  com- 
mission to  look  into  the  merits  of  the  case,  and  stating  the 
right  and  intention  of  the  United  States  to  adjudicate  the 
dispute.    Said  Mr.  Cleveland: 

''It  -will,  in  my  opinion,  be  the  duty  of  the  United  States 
to  resist  by  every  means  in  its  power,  as  a  wilful  aggression 
upon  its  rights  and  interests,  the  appropriation  by  Great 
Britain  of  any  lands  or  the  exercise  of  governmental  jur- 
isdiction over  any  territory  which  after  investigation  we 
have  determined  of  right  belongs  to  Venezuela.  In  mak- 
ing these  recommendations  I  am  fully  alive  to  the  respon- 
sibility incurred  and  keenly  realize  all  the  consequences 
that  may  follow." 

Although  the  Tory  press  in  England  was  eager  to  take 
up  the  challenge,  the  imperial  problems  arising  in  the 
Sudan  and  South  Africa,  and  the  strained  relations  with 
France  and  Russia,  made  the  government  decide  to  yield 
to  the  peremptory  American  demand.^  The  Venezuela 
boundary  question  was  submitted  to  arbitration.  War  with 
the  United  States  was  repugnant  to  the  British  people  and 
would  have  resulted  in  the  loss  of  Canada.  British  states- 
men and  intelligent  public  opinion  realized,  also,  that 
Cleveland's  action  had  a  deeper  significance  than  the  set- 

^See  p.  168. 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    343 

tlemeiit  of  the  question  that  prompted  it.  The  assertion 
of  the  Monroe  Doctrine  for  the  first  time  with  specific 
legislative  indorsement  indicated  that  the  United  States 
had  reached  a  stage  where  isolation  was  no  longer  pos- 
sible. The  canal,  when  built,  must  be  protected.  The 
United  States  could  not  afford  to  have  any  European 
nation  exercising  a  political  influence  equal  or  superior  to 
hers  in  South  America.  For  seventy  years  the  Monroe 
Doctrine  had  never  been  seriously  challenged,  because 
Europeans  had  a  free  field  in  Africa  and  Asia.  And  now 
that  they  were  beginning  to  look  elsewhere  the  United 
States  had  become  strong  enough  to  accept  ''the  respon- 
sibility incurred"  and  ''all  the  consequences  that  may 
follow. ' ' 

Seven  years  later,  when  conditions  had  greatly  changed 
to  the  advantage  of  the  United  States,  Great  Britain,  in 
conjunction  with  Germany  and  Italy,  tested  the  Monroe 
Doctrine.  A  joint  naval  demonstration  was  made  against 
Venezuela  to  force  her  to  acknowledge  and  agree  to  pay  a 
number  of  claims.  The  United  States  intervened,  and, 
when  the  powers  were  assured  that  Venezuela  would  recog- 
nize the  claims  and  refer  them  to  commissions,  Great 
Britain  and  Italy  withdrew.  Germany  seemed  disposed  to 
continue  the  demonstration,  but  recalled  her  fleet  when 
President  Roosevelt  told  the  German  ambassador  that  the 
maintenance  of  the  blockade  might  lead  to  war. 

The  United  States  opposed  the  transfer  of  Cuba  from 
Spain  to  France  in  1826  and  to  Great  Britain  in  1839  and 
1843.  We  tried  to  purchase  Cuba  in  1848,  and  the  first 
filibustering  expedition  took  place  the  following  year.  The 
Cuban  question  was  a  national  issue  in  the  presidential 
election  of  1856,  and  in  1859  Congress  again  debated  the 
purchase  of  the  island.  Between  the  Mexican  War  and  the 
Civil  War  the  canal  question  was  a  consideration  in  our 
policy  towards  Cuba,  but  the  desire  of  the  southern  states 
to  extend  slave  territory,  or  at  least  to  prevent  emancipa- 


■}44         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tion  in  the  island  if  Cuba  passed  into  British  or  French 
hands,  was  undoubtedly  the  principal  motive  of  the  agita- 
tion for  annexation.  After  the  Civil  War  the  issue  of 
slavery  disappeared  from  American  internal  politics,  and 
the  canal  question  was  held  in  abeyance  during  thirty  years 
of  transcontinental  railway  construction. 

American  public  opinion  came  to  regard  an  Atlantic- 
Pacific  canal  as  essential  to  the  prosperity  of  the  United 
States;  the  status  of  Cuba  and  the  Hawaiian  Islands  and 
the  freedom  of  Latin-American  countries  bordering  on  the 
Caribbean  Sea  became  the  principal  issues  in  foreign 
policy.  Plans  were  made  for  the  annexation  of  Hawaii. 
The  nation  stood  behind  President  Cleveland  when  he  or- 
dered marines  to  Bluefields  in  Nicaragua  in  1894,  after 
news  had  come  of  a  British  landing,  and  when  he  challenged 
Great  Britain  on  the  Venezuelan  question.  The  news- 
papers began  to  feature  the  Cuban  insurrection  of  1895, 
and,  although  Cleveland  stood  resolutely  against  the  prop- 
aganda for  war  with  Spain,  a  state  of  mind  was  gradually 
created  that  needed  only  an  exciting  pretext  to  make  war 
inevitable.  It  was  amply  furnished  by  a  tragic  disaster 
that  public  opinion  interpreted,  without  waiting  for  proof, 
as  an  overt  act.  On  February  15,  1898,  at  the  end  of  the 
second  year  of  McKinley's  first  administration,  the  battle- 
ship Maine  was  blown  up  in  Havana  harbor.  On  April 
19  Congress  decided  that  the  United  States  had  to  fight  to 
free  Cuba. 

The  short  and  one-sided  war  ended  in  the  peace  protocol 
of  August  12,  by  which  Spain  agreed  to  evacuate  Cuba  and 
the  Philippines  and  relinquish  Spanish  sovereignty  over 
them,  and  to  cede  Porto  Rico  and  one  of  the  Ladrones  to 
the  United  States  in  lieu  of  indemnity.  On  the  same  day 
the  Hawaiian  Islands  were  formally  annexed  to  the  United 
States.  The  treaty  of  Paris,  signed  on  December  10,  1898, 
confirmed  the  cession  of  Porto  Rico  and  Guam  and  the 
independence   of   Cuba,   and   relinquished  to  the   United 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)     345 

States  the  Philippine  Islands  for  a  cash  payment  of  twenty 
million  dollars. 

The  Spanish-American  War  established  the  hegemony 
of  the  United  States  in  the  western  hemisphere.  It  caused 
a  change  not  only  in  our  own  relations,  but  also  in  the  rela- 
tions of  European  powers,  with  Latin  America.  The  pre- 
dominant cultural  influence  of  Europe  persisted,  however, 
and  the  United  States  was  not  yet  ready  to  assert  her  com- 
mercial and  financial  ascendency  in  Latin-American  affairs. 
Much  groundwork,  neglected  up  to  this  time,  had  to  be  done. 
Direct  cable  and  steamship  communications  and  banking 
facilities  were  still  lacking.  These  had  to  await  the  time 
when  American  finance  and  industry  needed  foreign  fields 
for  investment  and  markets  for  trade.  During  the  first 
two  decades  of  the  twentieth  century  the  increasing  wealth 
and  population  of  the  United  States  automatically 
strengthened  her  power  and  prestige,  which  received  a 
striking  opportunity  to  prove  itself  in  the  World  War. 
But  certain  deliberate  forces  were  also  working  to  estab- 
lish pohtical  conditions  that  would  render  unquestioned 
the  control  of  the  American  continents  by  the  United 
States. 

The  most  important  factor  in  maintaining  the  advan- 
tages won  by  the  Spanish-American  War  was  our  navy. 
When  we  look  back  to  the  ''great  white  fleet"  that  won  the 
battle  of  Santiago  and  to  the  Pacific  squadron  that  de- 
stroyed the  Spanish  fleet  at  Manila  Bay,  and  compare  the 
ships  of  Sampson  and  Dewey  with  those  of  a  quarter  of  a 
century  later,  we  wonder  how  President  Cleveland  dared 
to  fling  the  Monroe  Doctrine  into  Great  Britain's  face.  It 
was  fortunate  that  decadent  Spain  was  the  European  power 
with  which  we  had  to  fight.  However,  w^e  were  sobered 
rather  than  dazzled  by  our  easy  victory.  From  1898  to 
1922  the  American  people  spent  at  times  in  a  single  year 
more  money  on  naval  armament  than  during  the  previous 
half-century,  and  they  finally  reached  a  position  where 


346         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Great  Britain  had  to  agree  to  the  principle  of  equality  of 
sea  power.^  Most  of  the  ships  were  kept  in  American 
waters,  and  after  the  opening  of  the  Panama  Canal  the 
naval  power  of  the  United  States  in  the  western  hemi- 
sphere had  passed  the  point  where  it  could  be  challenged. 
And  yet,  sixteen  years  earlier  the  Oregon  had  had  to  steam 
ten  thousand  miles  around  South  America  to  join  the  At- 
lantic Squadron,  making  the  long  voyage  not  only  because 
there  was  no  canal,  but  also  because  it  was  believed  that  a 
single  ship  might  make  the  difference  between  victory  and 
defeat  in  a  battle  with  the  Spanish. 

The  South  American  republics  made  no  attempt  to  follow 
the  example  of  the  United  States  in  building  capital  ships. 
Between  the  Spanish-American  War  and  1917  Argentina 
and  Chile  acquired  no  new  capital  ships.  In  1917  the 
Argentine  navy  had  seven  ships,  totaling  35,000  tons,  all 
of  them  old.  Chile  had  two  battle-ships,  two  armored 
cruisers,  and  four  cruisers,  the  newest  of  which  was  laid 
down  in  1898.  No  unit  of  the  Chilean  navy  was  over  9000 
tons.  Brazil  laid  down  two  dreadnoughts  of  20,000  tons 
each  and  two  protected  cruisers  of  3500  tons  each  in  1907, 
but  made  no  increases  during  the  next  decade.  Practically 
speaking,  therefore,  the  republics  of  Latin  America  were 
completely  at  the  mercy  of  the  United  States,  and,  even 
had  they  been  disposed  to  do  so,  they  could  have  formed 
a  feasible  coalition  with  no  other  European  power  than 
Great  Britain. 

Next  to  the  navy,  the  Panama  Canal  is  responsible  for 
the  predominant  position  of  the  United  States  in  the  west- 
ern world.  According  to  the  Clayton-Bulwer  treaty  of 
1850  the  Atlantic-Pacific  canal  was  to  be  constructed  by  a 
private  corporation.  In  1884  a  French  company  under  de 
Lesseps,  builder  of  the  Suez  Canal,  began  to  cut  through 
the  Isthmus  of  Panama.    After  four  years,  three  hundred 

'  In  the  agreement  for  limitation  of  naval  armaments,  signed  during  the 
Washington  conference,  February,  1922. 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    347 

million  dollars  had  been  spent  and  only  one  third  of  the 
work  was  completed.    The  enterprise  collapsed. 

When  the  United  States  again  became  interested  in  the 
canal  project,  the  necessity  of  negotiating  with  Great 
Britain  for  a  revision  of  the  treaty  of  1850  was  recognized. 
We  were  not  then  in  the  same  position  as  at  the  time  of  the 
earlier  agreement.  President  Buchanan  had  been  able  to 
prevent  Great  Britain  from  following  in  Central  America 
"the  policy  which"  (in  Buchanan's  own  words)  **she  has 
uniformly  pursued  throughout  her  history,  of  seizing  upon 
every  available  commercial  point  in  the  world  whenever 
circumstances  have  placed  it  within  her  power."  But  it 
was  at  the  price  of  assenting  to  international  control  of 
the  proposed  canal.  The  American  State  Department 
pointed  out  that  the  canal  was  different  from  a  natural 
waterway  and  that  Great  Britain  herself  had  seized  Egypt 
to  control  the  Suez  Canal.  It  was  declared  that  if  the 
Clayton-Bulwer  treaty  were  not  revised,  the  United  States, 
on  the  ground  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  would  oppose  and 
prevent  either  international  or  private  European  control  of 
an  Atlantic-Pacific  canal.  The  American  government  of- 
fered to  allow  the  canal  to  be  built  by  a  private  corporation 
exclusively  controlled  by  the  United  States  or  to  construct 
and  operate  the  canal  itself.  The  British  government  not 
only  refused  to  revise  the  treaty,  but  also  endeavored  to 
block  the  United  States  by  an  agreement  with  the  Panama 
Company  and  by  scheming  to  establish  a  protectorate  over 
the  Indians  of  the  Mosquito  Coast  through  whose  country 
the  alternate  Nicaragua  route  passed. 

The  firmness  shown  by  President  Cleveland  in  the 
Venezuela  boundary  question  and  the  sweeping  victory 
over  Spain  convinced  the  British  that  the  canal  would 
never  be  built  if  the  Clayton-Bulwer  treaty  continued  to 
tie  the  United  States  hand  and  foot.  Secretary  Hay  suc- 
ceeded in  negotiating  a  new  treaty,  which  was  signed  in 
1900.    This  Hay-Pauncefote  treaty  provided  for  a  neutral- 


348         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ized  canal  under  American  government  ownership,  and 
rules  for  control  were  stipulated  like  those  for  the  Suez 
Canal.  The  Senate  refused  to  ratify  the  treaty  until  Great 
Britain  admitted  that  the  neutralization  would  be  enforced 
by  the  United  States  alone,  and  was  not  to  be  interpreted 
as  depriving  the  United  States  of  power  to  police  the  canal. 
The  Senate  also  rejected  the  clause  forbidding  fortifica- 
tion. Under  the  pressure  of  shipping  interests,  Great 
Britain  finally  compromised  and  agreed  to  these  modifica- 
tions. The  important  clause,  in  British  eyes,  was  that 
which  promised  no  discrimination  in  tolls. 

After  the  British  had  been  satisfied,  the  United  States 
had  still  to  negotiate  with  the  Panama  Canal  Company  and 
the  Colombian  government.  Because  of  our  ability  to 
frighten  it  with  the  Nicaragua  alternative,  which  was 
authorized  by  Congress,  the  French  company  finally  agreed 
to  sell  out  its  rights  at  a  reasonable  figure.  The  offer  was 
accepted  with  the  proviso  that  the  money  would  be  paid 
only  if  and  when  the  Republic  of  Colombia  gave  to  the 
United  States  perpetual  authority  and  jurisdiction  over  a 
strip  across  the  Isthmus  of  Panama  not  less  than  six  miles 
in  width.  A  treaty  was  made  with  Colombia  for  a  canal 
zone  on  the  basis  of  a  payment  in  cash  and  an  annuity. 
When  the  Colombian  Senate,  acting  as  the  American  Senate 
has  so  often  acted  in  the  case  of  treaties,  refused  to  ratify 
the  agreement,  the  officials  of  the  French  canal  company, 
desperate  over  the  possible  loss  of  a  portion  of  their  invest- 
ment that  might  be  retrieved,  organized  a  revolution  in 
Panama.  The  United  States  refused  to  permit  the  Colom- 
bian troops  to  put  do^vn  the  revolt,  and  President  Roose- 
velt immediately  recognized  the  new  ''Republic  of 
Panama."  The  only  comment  that  can  be  made  upon  this 
affair  is  that  the  American  government  showed  great  apti- 
tude for  the  science  of  world  politics.  Roosevelt  after- 
wards declared  that  the  end  justified  the  means,  and  that 
if  he  had  allowed  Colombia  to  exercise  her  sovereign  rights 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)     349 

the  construction  of  the  canal  would  have  been  delayed 
indefinitely. 

On  February  23,  1904,  the  United  States  Senate  ratified 
a  new  canal  convention,  this  time  with  the  Republic  of 
Panama,  agreeing  to  give  to  Panama  the  same  financial 
compensation  as  that  which  had  been  offered  to  Colombia. 
The  canal  zone,  however,  was  widened  to  ten  miles.  After 
ten  years,  on  August  15,  1914,  the  Panama  Canal,  financed, 
constructed,  owned,  and  managed  by  the  United  States, 
was  opened  to  the  commerce  of  the  world.  It  was  built  on 
American  territory,  subject  only  to  a  perpetual  annual 
ground-rent  of  $250,000.  The  ports  at  either  end  had 
become  virtually  American,  and  the  canal  was  heavily  for- 
tified. The  only  restrictions  imposed  upon  the  United 
States  are  those  of  the  Hay-Pauncefote  treaty,  which  have 
been  differently  interpreted  by  successive  American  admin- 
istrations.^ 

Nearly  twenty-five  per  cent,  of  the  world's  present  oil 
production  stands  to  the  credit  of  Mexico.  This  fact, 
coupled  with  the  extensive  American  and  European  mining 
investments  of  the  past  quarter  century,  has  radically 
changed  the  tenor  of  the  relations  between  the  United 
States  and  her  southern  neighbor.  As  long  as  the  outside 
world  did  not  know,  or  need,  the  unrivaled  oil  and  mineral 
resources  of  Mexico  her  internal  quarrels  were  of  no  con- 
sequence, and  the  United  States  was  able  to  abide  by  the 
Jeffersonian  principle  that  ''all  governments  derive  their 
just  powers  from  the  consent  of  the  governed. ' '  But  when 
European  and  American  investors  in  enterprises  in  Mexico 
found  themselves  injured  in  their  prosperity  by  the  politi- 

^  From  the  beginning  of  the  renewal  of  the  Atlantic-Pacific  project  the 
various  questions  that  arose  were  complicated  by  considerations  and  conflicting 
motives.  Whether  the  Nicaragua  or  Panama  route  should  be  cliosen;  whether 
the  canal  should  be  constructed  at  sea-level  or  with  locks;  whether  President 
Eoosevelt's  policy  in  regard  to  the  Panama  Revolution  was  justified  or  should 
be  condemned  by  an  apology,  with  indemnity,  to  Colombia;  and  whether  the 
rebates  to  American  ships  engaged  in  coastal  trade  constituted  a  violation  of 
the  Hay-Pauncefote  treaty  or  followed  the  letter  and  spirit  of  the  agreement — 
these  were  all  moot  questions  on  which  public  opinion  was  divided. 


350  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

cal  evolution  of  the  Mexican  people,  which  led  to  a  struggle 
against  absolutism  and  to  changes  of  government  by  vio- 
lence, the  American  government  was  placed  in  an  embar- 
rassing position. 

The  United  States  had  never  followed  the  policy  of  Euro- 
pean governments  in  regard  to  the  protection  of  the  lives 
and  property  of  their  nationals  in  non-European  countries 
by  using  force  when  diplomatic  representations  failed.  On 
the  other  hand,  this  policy  had  been  condemned  by  us  on 
the  ground  that  the  strong  were  unable  to  resist  the  temp- 
tation of  settling  differences  to  suit  their  own  interests  and 
of  using  them  as  a  pretext  for  extending  their  political  and 
economic  domination  over  weak  peoples. 

The  Monroe  Doctrine  had  prevented  the  extension  of 
European  political  control  over  the  Latin- American  repub- 
lics. But  American  trade  and  investment  interests  had 
been  small  and  had  meant  little  or  nothing  to  our  national 
prosperity.  When  a  state  of  anarchy  developed  in  Mexico, 
we  realized  for  the  first  time  how  strong  were  the  influ- 
ences that  had  inspired  and  directed  this  European  atti- 
tude. For  we  had  a  large  stake  in  Mexico.  Moreover,  did 
not  the  Monroe  Doctrine  obligate  us,  since  we  denied  that 
right  to  Europe,  to  protect  the  lives  and  property  of  Euro- 
peans in  American  countries'?  At  the  outbreak  of  the 
European  war  a  concrete  illustration  of  the  dilemma  was 
forced  upon  us.  The  largest  source  of  oil  supply  for  the 
British  navy  was  in  the  Tampico  region  of  Mexico.  If  this 
were  diminished  or  cut  off  by  internal  Mexican  revolutions, 
did  we  have  the  right  to  forbid  the  British  government  to 
intervene  and  at  the  same  time  not  assume  the  obligation 
of  seeing  that  British  companies  were  protected  in  pro- 
ducing oil  from  their  own  wells? 

International  obligations,  as  well  as  our  own  internal 
economic  interests,  required  the  occupation  of  Vera  Cruz 
by  the  American  navy  in  1914  and  a  punitive  military  expe- 
dition against  General  Villa  in  1916.    But  President  Wilson 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    351 

was  determined  not  to  be  stampeded  into  a  war  against 
Mexico,  especially  as  he  felt  that  the  political  unrest  was 
due  to  a  legitimate  effort  of  the  Mexican  people  to  estab- 
lish a  democratic  form  of  government.  American  interven- 
tion in  Europe,  and  its  aftermath,  prevented  the  Mexican 
crisis  from  becoming,  in  the  minds  of  American  people,  too 
acute  for  peaceful  settlement.  Burdened  with  debts  and 
international  problems,  and  weary  of  military  service  and 
war,  the  American  people  are  no  longer  moved  by  the 
propaganda  for  intervention  in  Mexico.^  But  the  question 
will  come  to  the  fore  again  within  a  few  years  unless  the 
Mexicans  are  able  to  find  statesmen  who  will  unite  the 
country  and  put  an  end  to  the  revolutions  and  consequent 
economic  disorganization  that  make  insecure  the  lives  and 
profitless  the  investments  of  foreigners. 

After  the  Spanish-American  War,  Cuba,  although  inde- 
pendent, remained  under  the  tutelage  of  the  United  States, 
and  Porto  Rico  became  American  territory.  The  Virgin 
Islands  were  acquired  by  purchase  from  Denmark  in  1917. 
This  development  has  led  the  United  States  along  the  path 
followed  by  other  powers  when  they  have  established  their 
sovereignty  in  regions  away  from  home.  Each  new  as- 
sumption of  overlordship  leads  to  others.  The  status  of 
adjacent  countries,  and  what  is  happening  there,  interests 
the  colonial  power,  and  the  excuse  is  easily  found  for 
intervention. 

Within  a  decade  of  the  annexation  of  Porto  Rico  the 
United  States  intervened  in  Santo  Domingo,  and  ^\'ithin 
another  decade  we  found  ourselves  occupying  Haiti,  sup- 

^  The  Harding  administration  has  followed  the  policy  of  the  Wilson  ad- 
ministration in  withholding  recognition  of  the  government  of  President 
Obregon  on  the  ground  that  article  XXVII  of  the  new  Mexican  constitution 
is  an  infringement  upon  private  property  rights.  President  Obregon  has 
declared:  "Every  private  right  acquired  prior  to  May  1,  1917,  when  the  new 
constitution  was  adopted,  will  be  respected  and  fully  protected."  The 
American  State  Department  does  not  seem  to  trust  this  pledge.  Secretary 
Hughes  has  explained  the  Mexican  situation  in  the  following  words:  "The 
fundamental  question  which  confronts  the  government  of  the  United  Statea 
in  considering  its  relations  with  Mexico  is  the  safeguarding  of  property  rights 
against  confiscation. ' ' 


352         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

pressing  the  legislature,  and  proclaiming  martial  law.^ 
Thus  the  three  republics  of  the  West  Indies,  before  the 
close  of  the  second  Wilson  administration,  had  become 
virtual  American  protectorates.  At  the  same  time,  north- 
ward from  the  canal  zone  the  preponderant  influence  of 
the  United  States  began  to  be  felt  in  the  Central  American 
republics.  The  State  Department  now  informs  the  Central 
American  countries  how  they  should  act  towards  each  other, 
and  if  the  peremptory  advice  is  not  followed,  war-ships 
appear  in  the  offing  and  marines  are  landed.^ 

After  studying  the  map  of  the  islands  that  stretch  from 
Florida  to  Venezuela  the  new  American  imperialist  is 
alarmed  when  he  sees  that  Cuba  is  flanked  on  the  north  by 
the  Bahamas  and  on  the  south  by  Jamaica  and  the  three 
Caymans.  At  the  eastern  end  of  the  Caribbean  Sea  he 
finds  Great  Britain  and  France  in  control  of  the  Leeward 
and  Windward  Islands,  and  Holland  off  the  north  coast  of 
Venezuela.  The  events  of  the  past  twenty  years  have 
caused  American  public  opinion,  which  formerly  did  not 
bother  about  Cuba,  to  resent  the  presence  of  European 
powers  in  our  Caribbean  Sea.  The  great  Caribbean  power 
is  the  United  States,  and,  because  the  Panama  Canal  must 
be  protected  and  European  intrigues  anticipated,  the  inde- 
pendent countries  and  islands  of  the  West  Indies  and  the 
Caribbean  coast  must  allow  Washington  to  supervise  both 
their  foreign  and  internal  affairs,  and  New  York  to  manage 
their  finances  and  economic  life.  The  proposition  has  been 
advanced  that  we  buy  out  British  and  French  interests  in 
the  West  Indies  by  canceling  a  portion  of  the  war  debts. 
In  point  of  fact,  the  continued  presence  of  the  British  and 
the  French  in  the  West  Indies  is  of  no  importance,  now 

^  See  p.  339. 

^  Shortly  after  the  administration  of  Harding  succeeded  that  of  Wilson, 
Secretary  Hughes  sent  a  note  of  this  character  to  Costa  Eiea  in  regard  to  a 
border  dispute  with  Panama.  The  State  Department  still  regards  Nicaragua 
as  a  virtual  protectorate,  and  we  hear  the  European  diplomatic  expression 
''special  interests"  used  to  justify  certain  measures  infringing  on  Nicaraguan 
sovereignty. 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    353 

that  American  naval  supremacy  in  the  western  hemisphere 
is  assured.  Since  the  Spanish-American  War  the  United 
States  controls  the  communications  of  Mexico  and  Central 
America  with  the  outside  world,  and  is  in  a  position  to 
invade  Mexico  by  land  from  the  south  through  Guatemala. 

In  South  America,  however,  the  United  States  is  only 
potentially  the  dominant  power.  Until  recently  most  of 
the  intercourse  of  South  American  countries  with  the  out- 
side world  was  with  Europe  and  by  means  of  Europe. 
Although  they  profited  by  the  Monroe  Doctrine  and  appre- 
ciated what  it  meant  to  them,  South  Americans  were  sus- 
picious and  afraid  of  their  powerful  North  American 
friend.  In  the  Pan-American  conferences  they  combined  to 
defeat  suggestions  of  the  United  States  sometimes  simply 
because  of  their  source.  Our  dealings  with  Mexico  and 
Colombia,  and  of  late  years  with  Haiti  and  Santo  Domingo, 
have  awakened  justifiable  fears  of  the  intention  of  the 
United  States  to  dictate  in  South  America  as  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  Russia  have  been  dictating  in  Asia  and  Great 
Britain  and  France  in  Africa.  All  the  states  but  one  are 
of  Spanish  origin.  They  sympathized  with  Spain  during 
the  war  of  1898.  Their  language,  customs,  affinities  tend 
to  keep  them  aloof  from  us.  The  only  rapprochement  vdth 
North  America  is  that  of  common  interests — a  field  that 
has  not  yet  been  much  developed.  As  is  natural  for  weaker 
states,  they  are  not  inclined  to  accept  our  leadership,  moral 
or  material,  with  the  eagerness  we  think  they  ought  to 
manifest. 

In  1916  President  Wilson  proposed  that  the  independent 
states  of  America  unite  in  guaranteeing  to  each  other 
"absolute  political  independence  and  territorial  integrity" 
and  give  mutual  promises  to  abstain  from  settling  disputes 
except  by  arbitration,  and  to  prevent  aid  either  in  arms  or 
in  men  from  being  given  to  foment  and  encourage  political 
revolutions  in  neighboring  states.  The  South  American 
press  retorted  with  the  principle  of  Grotius,  i.  e.,  that 


354         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  AVORLD  POLITICS 

equality  was  the  basis  of  sovereignty  and  of  free  coopera- 
tion of  states.  American  diplomacy  in  Santo  Domingo  and 
Haiti,  and  the  unpleasant  story  connected  with  the  birth 
of  the  Republic  of  Panama,  seemed  to  belie  the  worth  of 
the  mutual  guaranty,  where  one  of  the  parties  was  so  much 
stronger  than  the  others,  unless  it  was  based  upon  the  domi- 
nation of  that  power. 

Of  the  eight  Latin-American  republics  that  entered  the 
war,  three  were  under  American  tutelage  (Cuba,  Haiti, 
and  Panama)  and  four  were  dominated  by  the  United 
States  (Costa  Rica,  Guatemala,  Honduras,  and  Nicaragua). 
Only  Brazil,  of  all  the  South  American  states,  entered  the 
war,  and  had  a  seat  at  the  peace  conference. 

The  Monroe  Doctrine  was  incorrectly  described  (and 
recognized)  in  the  covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations  as  a 
''regional  understanding."  It  is  not  an  understanding, 
however,  but  a  unilateral  declaration  of  policy  on  the  part 
of  the  United  States,  promulgated  as  a  measure  of  security 
and  not  as  a  blanket  assurance  of  protection  to  weak  states 
or  as  a  bid  for  a  spheres-of-influence  arrangement  with 
other  powers.  The  regional  understandings,  such  as  the 
Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904,  the  Anglo-Russian  agree- 
ment of  1907,  and  the  various  conventions  among  the  Euro- 
pean powers  in  regard  to  Africa  and  Asia  (notably  the 
Sudan,  Congo,  and  China  conventions),  were  reciprocal 
compacts,  based  on  a  quid  pro  quo.  The  Monroe  Doctrine, 
on  the  other  hand,  was  negative  in  character,  and  was  not 
interpreted  by  the  United  States  to  give  our  government  a 
right  to  oppose,  as  the  regional  understandings  of  Euro- 
pean diplomacy  did,  the  efforts  of  nationals  of  European 
powers  to  seek  concessions,  investment  opportunities,  and 
trade  monopolies  in  Latin-American  countries. 

As  long  as  territorial  extension  and  the  establishment  of 
protectorates  were  not  the  objectives  of  European  diplo- 
macy, the  United  States  did  not  protest  against  the  abuse 
of  force  in  the  dealings  of  Europe  with  the  Latin-American 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    355 

republics.  Our  financiers  and  business  men  were  not  yet 
attracted  by  the  opportunities  of  Latin-American  exploita- 
tion. As  late  as  1902  the  United  States  recognized  the 
validity  of  the  position  taken  by  Palmerston  in  1848,  that 
a  state  always  has  the  right,  if  convinced  that  justice  is 
denied,  to  support  the  pecuniary  claims  of  its  citizens  by 
force  against  a  country  whose  courts  they  are  unwilling 
to  trust.  This  principle  had  been  contested  at  the  time  by 
the  Argentine  jurist  Calvo,  who  contended  that  a  state  had 
no  right  to  take  up,  even  as  a  matter  of  diplomatic  action, 
the  pecuniary  claims  of  its  citizens  or  subjects  against 
another  state. 

At  the  time  of  the  joint  intervention  of  Great  Britain, 
Italy,  and  Germany  in  Venezuela  in  1902,  our  State  Depart- 
ment admitted  that  these  three  powers  had  the  right  to 
intervene  with  force,  provided  they  did  not  violate  the 
Monroe  Doctrine  by  acquiring  territory  or  by  oppressing 
or  instigating  the  overthrow  of  the  Venezuelan  govern- 
ment. The  Argentine  minister  of  foreign  affairs,  Drago, 
protested,  with  unanimous  South  American  public  opinion 
behind  him,  claiming  that  while  international  law  did  not, 
as  Calvo  had  said,  forbid  the  making  of  diplomatic  repre- 
sentations, it  did  deny  the  use  of  military  or  naval  force 
for  the  collection  of  pecuniary  claims.  Between  1902  and 
1907,  when  the  second  Hague  conference  met,  the  United 
States  changed  her  ground,  and  the  American  delegates 
advocated  the  principle  that  international  debts  should  be 
ascertained  and  collected  by  some  process  of  law  and  not 
by  arbitrary  force.  Mr.  Root,  in  his  instructions  to  the 
delegates,  explained  this  stand  by  stating  that  such  use  of 
force  was  ''inconsistent  with  respect  for  the  independent 
sovereignty  of  other  nations,"  and  seemed  to  the  United 
States  to  be  a  practice  ''injurious  in  its  general  effect  upon 
the  relations  of  nations  and  upon  the  welfare  of  weak  and 
disordered  states,  whose  development  ought  to  be  encour- 
aged in  the  interests  of  civilization." 


356  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

This  attitude,  maintained  from  1907  to  1916,  gratified  the 
Latin-American  republics  and  did  much  to  make  them  be- 
lieve that  the  United  States  intended  to  resist  the  current 
of  world  politics,  which  tended  to  make  force  the  arbiter 
in  differences  between  great  powers  and  small  states. 
Faith  in  American  sincerity,  however,  was  shaken  by  our 
dealings  with  Santo  Domingo  and  Haiti  during  the  second 
Wilson  administration  and  by  the  attitude  of  Mr.  Wilson 
towards  the  principle  of  equality  of  states  at  the  Paris  con- 
ference. There  was  difference  of  opinion  in  South  America 
over  the  Wilson  policy  towards  Mexico,  and  Washington 
had  not  rejected,  but  had  rather  welcomed,  the  mediation 
of  the  largest  three  South  American  states  in  the  earlier 
stages  of  the  breach  resulting  from  the  refusal  to  recognize 
Huerta  and  from  the  occupation  of  Vera  Cruz. 

During  the  campaign  of  1920  Mr.  Harding  and  several 
of  the  Republican  senators  attacked  the  outgoing  adminis- 
tration for  its  high-handed  and  brutal  policy  in  Haiti  and 
Santo  Domingo.  It  was  alleged  in  the  Senate  by  the  Repub- 
licans that  our  marine  forces  had  been  guilty  of  atrocities, 
and  that  the  arbitrary  dissolution  of  the  Haitian  parlia- 
ment and  censorship  of  news,  involving  the  imprisonment 
or  expulsion  of  journalists,  had  been  injurious  to  friendly 
relations  between  the  United  States  and  all  the  Latin- 
American  republics.  A  reversal  of  the  Wilson  policy  of 
dominating  these  two  peoples  by  armed  forces  in  the  in- 
terests of  American  financiers  was  promised.  But  Secre- 
tary Hughes  demanded  a  ratification  of  treaties  putting 
Haiti  and  Santo  Domingo  under  American  protection  as  a 
prerequisite  to  the  withdrawal  of  the  forces  of  occupation. 
And  a  senatorial  investigating  committee  under  Senator 
McCormick  returned  from  the  island  with  a  non-committal 
report. 

As  in  the  Philippines,  so  in  the  West  Indies :  it  is  easier 
to  take  than  to  give  up.  But  the  United  States  can  not 
pursue  a  policy  of  aggression  against  small  states  and  ex- 


UNITED  STATES  AND  LATIN  AMERICA  (1893-1917)    357 

pect  to  be  a  candidate  for  the  ''moral  leadership  of  the 
world."  The  European  powers  and  Japan  will  understand 
us  the  better  for  speaking  their  language  in  international 
relations ;  but  we  shall  lose  our  prestige  in  South  America 
and  the  respect  and  confidence  of  the  Latin-American  re- 
publics. 


CHAPTEE  XXXI 

THE  UNITED   STATES   IN   THE   COALITION  AGAINST   THE 
CENTRAL  EMPIRES   (1917-1918) 

THE  great  majority  of  Americans  regarded  the  Euro- 
pean war  as  an  interesting  and  dramatic  spectacle  in 
which  their  own  country  was  not  concerned.  Hence  they 
found  no  difficulty  in  following  the  president's  advice  that 
Americans  remain  neutral  in  thought  as  well  as  in  action. 
Despite  the  tireless  propaganda  carried  on  by  both  groups 
of  belligerents  to  win  American  support,  public  opinion  in 
general  accepted  without  question  the  declaration  of  Presi- 
dent Wilson  that  he  did  not  know  the  causes  of  the  war  and 
wished  that  some  one  would  tell  him.  Those  elements  that 
took  sides  violently  when  war  was  first  declared,  and  that 
worked  hard  for  thirty  months  to  advance  the  cause  of 
one  or  the  other  of  the  belligerent  groups,  met  with  little 
success. 

But  in  time  the  Germans,  who  seemed  to  glory  in  violat- 
ing the  ordinary  ethics  of  warfare  on  land  and  sea,  aroused 
American  indignation  by  the  sinking  of  the  Lusitania  and 
other  ships ;  and  this  bitterness  was  enhanced  by  the  revela- 
tions of  German  plots  against  American  industries,  planned 
and  carried  out  on  American  soil.  In  addition  to  their 
monumental  tactlessness,  the  Germans  suffered,  too,  from 
three  handicaps  that  gradually  turned  American  public 
opinion  against  them.  (1)  Unlike  Great  Britain,  Germany 
had  not  a  single  place  on  the  American  continent  where  she 
exercised  political  sovereignty,  and  therefore  her  propa- 
ganda and  her  espionage  service  was  driven  to  violation 
of  the  neutrality  of  the  United  States  and  other  nations. 
(2)  Not  controlling  any  cables  or  being  able  to  use  in  com- 

358 


UNITED  STATES  AGAINST  CENTRAL  EMPIRES     359 

municatioii  with  the  New  World  means  that  were  not  under 
the  surveillance  of  her  enemies,  Germany  had  to  resort  to 
discreditable  practices  to  keep  in  touch  with  her  agents. 
(3)  Her  inability  either  to  contest  the  supremacy  of  the 
sea  with  the  British  or  to  import  under  neutral  flags  and 
through  neutral  countries  made  it  impossible  to  purchase 
war  supplies  from  the  United  States,  and  thus  American 
finance  and  industry  became  more  and  more  interested  in 
the  success  of  the  Entente.  Interests  engender  sympathies, 
and  customers  are  backed  against  non-customers. 

After  two  years  of  war,  however,  during  which  there  was 
ample  opportunity  for  the  United  States  to  become  fully 
acquainted  with  the  German  methods  of  waging  war  on 
land  and  sea,  and  after  we  had  suffered  much  at  the  hands 
of  Germany,  the  sentiment  for  maintaining  neutrality  was 
still  so  strong  that  neither  candidate  at  the  presidential 
election  in  the  autumn  of  1916  dared  risk  giving  the  im- 
pression that  his  program  for  the  conduct  of  our  foreign 
relations  implied  a  departure  from  neutrality.  President 
Wilson  and  Mr.  Hughes  were  equally  afraid  to  advocate 
preparedness,  thinking  that  defeat  at  the  polls  was  certain 
for  any  man  whom  the  American  people  suspected  of  want- 
ing to  lead  them  into  the  war. 

In  view  of  these  facts,  which  tragically  stand  in  the 
way  of  sentimentalists,  it  is  difl&cult  to  accept  at  their  face 
value  the  principal  reasons  set  forth  by  President  Wilson 
on  April  2,  1917,  and  in  his  subsequent  speeches,  for  the 
entry  of  the  United  States  into  the  World  War.  The  vin- 
dication of  principles  of  peace  and  justice  against  selfish 
autocratic  power,  the  fight  for  democracy,  rights  of  small 
nations,  and  universal  domination  of  right  by  consent  of 
free  peoples  were  splendid  ideals  to  set  before  a  nation 
entering  upon  a  costly  struggle,  and  none  questions  the  pro- 
priety and  wisdom  of  voicing  them.  But  the  Entente 
Powers  had  begun  the  war  with  the  proclamation  of  those 
very  principles  almost  three  years  earlier.     Either  these 


360         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

principles  were  not  deemed  by  the  American  people  suf- 
ficiently important  to  fight  for,  or  the  nation  and  its  leaders 
had  as  a  whole  been  unaware  that  they  were  the  issues  at 
stake  until  the  beginning  of  1917.  We  can  not  get  away 
from  this  dilemma.  It  is  important  to  admit  it,  and  to  state 
the  bald  fact  of  the  case,  that  our  intervention  in  the  World 
War  followed  the  great  law  of  history,  which  is  that  peoples 
fight  when  they  feel  themselves  menaced  in  their  security 
and  prosperity,  and  not  until  then. 

It  took  time  for  American  public  opinion  to  realize  that 
privileges  can  not  be  enjoyed  without  assuming  responsi- 
bilities. Had  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  not  been 
capacity  purchasers  of  American  commodities,  whose  or- 
ders were  making  the  United  States  experience  an  unex- 
ampled prosperity  boom,  the  German  submarine  blockade 
might  not  have  been  considered  a  casus  belli}  On  the  other 
hand,  the  blockade  of  Germany  and  the  neutral  states  of 
northern  Europe,  which  had  also  been  in  effect  for  nearly 
three  years,  did  not  unduly  excite  American  public  opinion. 
For  it  was  understood  that  the  blockaders  were  always 
willing  to  buy  at  our  prices  whatever  goods  we  had  to  sell 
and  were  therefore  not  injuring  American  trade  by  the 
enforcement  of  the  arbitrary  British  orders  in  council. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  war  the  United  States 
addressed  numerous  and  sharp  protests  to  Great  Britain 
against  interference  with  American  trade  and  mails.  Lon- 
don answered  politely,  but  intimated  that  nothing  Wash- 
ington might  say  would  result  in  a  change  in  the  methods 
decided  upon  to  bring  Germany  to  her  knees.  The  British 
did  not  attempt  to  defend  their  actions  at  sea  by  denying 
the  soundness  of  our  interpretation  of  existing  maritime 
law,  but  shifted  the  argument  to  moral  grounds.  Germany 
was  a  criminal,  and  Great  Britain  was  defending  the  whole 

^  The  greatest  loss  of  American  lives  and  the  most  outrageous  example  of 
ruthlessness  occurred  two  years  before  the  declaration  of  war,  when  nearly  a 
thousand  non-combatants,  including  many  women  and  children,  went  down* 
on  the  Lusitania. 


UNITED  STATES  AGAINST  CENTRAL  EMPIRES     361 

world,  including  the  United  States,  against  her  attempt  to 
stifle  human  liberty  and  progress.  Washington  was  not 
convinced  that  the  British  argumenta  ad  hominem  were 
satisfactory  answers  to  reasonable  complaints,  but  the 
notes  of  the  American  State  Department,  although  they 
continued  to  protest  against  violations  of  international  law, 
became  academic  and  temporizing  as  the  Entente  powers 
increased  their  orders  for  American  goods  and  floated  loans 
at  attractive  interest  rates  through  American  bankers. 
Our  notes  to  Germany  became  more  insistent  and  less  com- 
promising in  proportion  as  our  trade  with  the  Entente 
powers  grew  in  importance.  There  was  nothing  deliberate 
or  intentional  in  this.  The  influences  of  self-interest,  how- 
ever, are  none  the  less  real  because  they  are  unconscious. 
American  prosperity  gradually  seemed  to  become  depen- 
dent upon  the  defeat  of  Germany,  and  at  the  same  time 
German  successes  began  to  worry  Entente  sjTupathizers  in 
the  United  States,  who  had  always  been  more  optimistic 
than  the  military  situation  justified. 

Without  exaggerating  or  attempting  to  build  up  a  thesis 
through  the  exclusion  of  other  factors, — for  the  motives 
inspiring  individual,  let  alone  collective,  action  are  always 
complex  and  difficult  to  evaluate, — we  are  justified  in  at- 
taching importance  to  the  parallel  between  the  economic 
and  political  trends  in  our  relations  with  European  states 
from.  August,  1914,  to  February,  1917.  It  was  inevitable 
that  we  should  finally  engage  in  war  with  the  country  whose 
activities  threatened  to  impair  our  prosperity.  This  hap- 
pened in  1812.    It  happened  again  in  1917. 

In  the  interim  Europe  fought  several  wars  of  far-reach- 
ing significance,  and  the  European  nations  were  in  constant 
competition  with  one  another  for  exclusive  political  and 
economic  spheres  throughout  the  world.  But  during  this 
period  the  United  States  had  no  part  in  European  quar- 
rels. As  long  as  the  United  States  was  a  self-sufficient 
country  she  was  engrossed  in  her  own  internal  develop- 


362         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ment.  She  had  unlimited  opportunities  for  expansion  in 
her  own  continent,  without  coming  into  conflict  with  any 
European  power.  As  she  constituted  within  her  own  bor- 
ders the  greatest  free-trade  area  in  the  world  and  did  not 
have  to  protect  herself  by  fleets,  armies,  and  alliances,  she 
could  be  indifferent  to  events  that  happened  elsewhere. 

As  we  have  seen,  the  United  States  changed  rapidly  from 
1893  to  the  outbreak  of  the  European  war,  but  the  bulk  of 
the  people  were  as  yet  unaware  of  our  interdependence 
with  other  nations,  especially  with  those  of  Europe.  At 
the  beginning  of  1917  both  our  security  and  our  prosperity 
seemed  menaced  by  the  action  of  Germany,  and  our  pride 
and  honor  were  brought  into  question.  On  January  22 
President  Wilson  spoke  before  the  Senate  of  the  advis- 
ability of  ** peace  without  victory"  as  the  means  of  termi- 
nating the  European  war.  Nine  days  later  Germany  de- 
clared an  unrestricted  submarine  campaign  against  neutral 
shipping.  Immediately  President  Wilson  became  the 
leader  of  a  militant  people,  and  not  many  months  later, 
although  the  issues  of  the  war  had  remained  the  same  for 
the  European  combatants,  the  American  president  declared 
that  the  questions  at  stake  could  be  settled  only  by  the  ap- 
plication of  force  to  the  uttermost  until  complete  victory 
was  obtained. 

On  April  14,  1916,  the  United  States  had  demanded  the 
punishment  of  the  submarine  commander  responsible  for 
the  attacks  on  the  Sussex  and  other  steamers  attacked  with- 
out warning,  on  which  American  travelers  had  been  injured 
or  killed;  a  full  indemnity;  and  guaranties  for  the  future. 
Germany  was  warned  that  delay  in  answering  would  mean 
the  breaking  off  of  diplomatic  relations.  On  May  4  Ger- 
many replied  that  she  had  exercised  great  restraint  in  the 
use  of  submarines  and  could  not  abandon  this  weapon  of 
self-defense  against  Great  Britain,  but  she  promised  to 
give  warning  before  sinking  vessels  and  to  make  every 
effort  to  save  life,  and  in  return  requested  the  United 


UNITED  STATES  AGAINST  CENTRAL  EMPIRES     363 

States  to  insist  that  Great  Britain  cease  to  interfere  with 
sea-borne  trade.  On  May  8  the  United  States  acknowl- 
edged the  receipt  of  Germany's  answer,  with  the  pledge 
given,  and  pointed  out  that  the  United  States  was  "unable 
to  discuss  the  suggestion  that  the  safety  of  American  citi- 
zens should  be  made  dependent  on  the  conduct  of  other 
governments."  This  is  how  matters  stood  when,  on  Janu- 
ary 31, 1917,  Germany  withdrew  the  pledge  and  notified  the 
world  that  she  intended  to  inaugurate  an  unrestricted  sub- 
marine blockade  of  her  enemies'  coasts.  President  Wilson 
gave  Count  Bernstorff,  German  ambassador  at  Washing- 
ton, his  passports  on  February  3.  After  waiting  two 
months  for  Germany  to  cancel  her  submarine  blockade  or- 
ders, the  United  States  declared  w^ar  on  April  6.^ 

From  the  first  day  the  participation  of  the  United  States 
was  whole-hearted.  President  Wilson  explained  that  the 
war  was  not  against  the  German  people  but  against  their 
government,  and  that  its  purpose  was  to  free  the  Germans 
as  well  as  other  peoples  from  the  oppression  of  autocratic 
and  irresponsible  government,  which  disturbed  the  world's 
peace  and  conducted  war  in  defiance  of  the  laws  of  hu- 
manity. The  American  ideals  were  elaborated  in  many 
speeches,  and  served  the  double  purpose  of  giving  the 
Americans  a  sacred  cause  to  fight  for  and  of  breaking  down 
the  morale  of  the  Germans,  who  were  not  averse  to  the  pro- 
gram of  peace  outlined  in  Mr.  Wilson's  * 'fourteen  points." 

The  Entente  powers  realized  that  the  intervention  of 
the  United  States,  aside  from  its  world-wide  moral  effect, 
would  bring  vital  economic  and  financial  aid.  The  United 
States  had  already  been  an  indispensable  provider  of  food- 
stuffs and  chemicals,  and  had  helped  appreciably  in  fur- 
nishing manufactured  products  and  raw  materials  for  ar- 

*0n  December  7,  1917,  war  was  declared  on  Austria-Hungary.  Turkey 
took  the  initiative  in  severing  diplomatic  relations  with  the  United  States  two 
weeks  before  we  joined  the  enemies  of  Germany.  But  President  Wilson  could 
never  be  induced  to  declare  war  on  Turkey  or  even  to  break  off  diplomatic 
relations  with  Bulgaria. 


364         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

mament  and  transportation.  But  all  the  Allied  powers  were 
reaching  the  end  of  their  credit  in  America,  and  they  had 
been  bidding  against  one  another  for  American  goods.  The 
abandonment  of  neutrality  meant  government  credits  in 
the  United  States,  the  speeding  up  of  production,  and  the 
control  of  prices  and  distribution.  The  German  shipping 
that  had  been  tied  up  in  American  ports  since  1914  became 
an  invaluable  addition  to  the  tonnage  at  the  disposition  of 
the  Entente  powers  for  the  transportation  of  their  Ameri- 
can purchases. 

It  was  soon  demonstrated  that  the  United  States  did  not 
intend  to  limit  her  participation  to  economic  or  naval  aid. 
Within  three  weeks  of  the  declaration  of  war  Congress 
voted  conscription,  and  on  June  25  the  first  fighting  troops 
landed  at  St.  Nazaire.  A  year  later  a  million  American 
soldiers  were  in  France,  and  this  fact,  given  out  with  a 
table  of  figures  for  each  month,  convinced  the  German  peo- 
ple that  their  government  had  deceived  them  concerning 
the  efficacy  of  submarine  warfare  and  that  they  would  soon 
be  overwhelmed  by  sheer  force  of  arms. 

Aside  from  the  influence  of  American  intervention  upon 
the  fortunes  of  the  war,  which  we  can  not  attempt  to  esti- 
mate here,  Germany's  folly  in  forcing  into  the  conflict  on 
the  side  of  her  enemies  the  one  great  power  that  had  re- 
mained aloof  radically  changed  the  distribution  and  com- 
parative strength  of  the  pieces  on  the  chessboard  of  world 
politics.  From  a  disinterested  observer  and  occasional 
adviser,  the  United  States  was  transformed  into  a  partner 
in  the  enterprise  of  universal  political  reconstruction,  finan- 
cial rehabilitation,  and  economic  readjustment. 

The  World  War  made  the  United  States  a  great  creditor 
nation,  interested  in  the  fiscal  policies  of  European  nations. 
^Vhen  we  transferred  to  European  nations  the  proceeds  of 
our  liberty  loans,  several  million  American  bondholders 
automatically  became  concerned  in  what  happened  to 
Europe ;  for  both  principal  and  interest  of  their  investment 


UNITED  STATES  AGAINST  CENTRAL  EMPIRES     365 

^ere  involved.  The  war  caused  us  to  develop  our  indus- 
trial and  agricultural  productivity  far  beyond  the  needs 
of  home  consumption,  and  to  invest  billions  in  a  merchant 
marine.  Therefore  we  were  to  be  left  at  the  end  of  the 
war  with  the  habit  formed  of  selling  heavily  abroad,  a  thing 
we  had  never  done  before,  and  with  a  considrable  merchant 
marine,  in  support  of  which  we  should  have  to  enter  into 
competition  with  European  powers,  especially  Great 
Britain  and  Japan,  for  the  carrying  trade  of  the  world. 

Because  our  participation  led  many  of  the  Latin-Ameri- 
can republics  and  China  and  Siam  to  enter  the  coalition 
against  the  central  powers,  the  United  States  assumed  a 
moral  responsibility  to  pursue  to  attainment  after  the  war 
the  objects  for  which  we  had  entered  it.  The  day  after 
President  Wilson  severed  diplomatic  relations  he  sent  a 
note  to  all  neutral  states,  even  the  smallest,  inviting  them 
to  follow  the  example  of  the  United  States,  and  when  we 
entered  the  war  these  countries  were  encouraged  to  declare 
war  on  Germany.  In  complying  with  the  request  of  Presi- 
dent Wilson  to  break  with  Germany,  several  states,  notably 
China,  officially  informed  our  State  Department  that  the 
United  States  was  being  taken  at  her  word.  Our  diplo- 
matic representatives  at  Peking,  Bangkok,  and  Rio  de 
Janeiro,  when  asked  to  notify  Washington  that  China, 
Siam,  and  Brazil  had  declared  war  on  Germany,  were  told 
that  this  action  was  inspired  by  the  hope  of  seeing  prevail 
in  international  relations  the  principles  for  which  (''and 
for  no  others")  President  Wilson  affirmed  that  Americans 
were  ready  to  sacrifice  their  treasure  and  lay  down  their 
lives. 

We  did  not  approve  the  objects  and  methods  of  world 
politics  as  practised  by  the  other  powers,  and,  through  our 
president,  we  said  so.  The  desire  to  cooperate  in  estab- 
lishing a  new  world  order  rather  than  merely  to  punish 
Germany  was  explicitly  stated  at  the  time  of  our  interven- 
tion.   Denunciation  of  the  evil  effect  of  world  politics  upon 


366         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

international  relations  was  the  leit-motiv  of  the  speeches  of 
Mr.  Wilson  before,  during,  and  after  our  participation  in 
the  war.  Weak  nations  throughout  the  world  believed  in 
the  sincerity  of  the  United  States,  and  our  word  was  con- 
sidered, especially  in  China,  as  good  as  our  bond.  Our 
''moral  leadership  of  the  world,"  therefore,  is  likely  to 
depend  on  the  measure  of  success  we  attain  in  giving  that 
leadership  the  character  we  promised  to  give  it. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

THE  DISINTEGRATION  OF  THE  ROMANOFF,  HAPSBURG,  AND 
OTTOMAN   EMPIRES   THROUGH   SELF-DETER- 
MINATION PROPAGANDA   (1917-1918) 

THE  first  reaction  to  the  Russian  Revolution  is  shown 
by  the  instructions  sent  to  the  ambassadors  at  Petro- 
grad.  The  new  government  was  to  be  recognized,  but  its 
leaders  must  be  given  to  understand  that  the  other  Entente 
powers  expected  an  unabated  military  effort  and  loyalty 
to  diplomatic  understandings.  As  long  as  the  revolution- 
ary leaders  promised  to  keep  up  the  war  and  not  to  change 
Russian  foreign  policy,  the  Paris  and  London  press  dwelt 
upon  the  advantages  of  the  revolution  to  the  Allied  cause. 
What  had  been  denied  before  was  now  admitted — that 
czarist  Russia  had  been  on  the  verge  of  making  peace  with 
Germany.  The  revolution  was  taken,  therefore,  as  a  sign 
of  the  anti-German  sentiment  of  the  Russian  people.  The 
embarrassing  alliance  between  Occidental  democracies  and 
an  Oriental  autocracy  in  a  war  for  freedom  no  longer  made 
the  war  aims  of  the  Entente  seem  inconsistent  with  the 
professions  of  British  and  French  statesmen.  The  central 
empires  had  been  greatly  helped  up  to  this  time  by  the 
necessary  opposition  of  the  Entente  to  the  aspirations  of 
Poland  and  Finland  and  by  the  pledge  that  Constantinople 
should  be  awarded  to  Russia. 

But  no  sooner  had  the  new  Russian  government  agreed 
to  acknowledge  the  rights  of  Poles  and  Finns  than  a  re- 
markable Ukrainian  demonstration  occurred  in  the  streets 
of  Petrograd,  and  an  autonomous  government  was  set  up 
at  Kieff.  Other  separatist  movements  started  in  various 
parts  of  the  old  empire.    The  Don  and  Kuban  Cossacks 

367 


368         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  the  peoples  of  the  Caucasus  announced  that  the  revo- 
lution meant  freedom  for  them  as  well  as  for  the  Poles  and 
the  Finns.  When  espousing  the  doctrine  of  self-determina- 
tion as  a  means  of  destroying  the  Austro-Hungarian  and 
Ottoman  empires  and  taking  slices  off  the  German  Empire, 
Entente  statesmen  had  discounted  its  disastrous  effect  in 
the  Russian  Empire,  which  had  been  created  and  was  held 
together  only  by  a  strong  military  despotism. 

At  the  very  beginning  of  the  war,  Entente  propagandists 
raised  the  question  of  subject  nationalities,  but  determined 
to  ignore  the  aspirations  to  independence  of  all  other  peo- 
ples save  those  under  the  yoke  of  enemy  countries.  There 
was  wisdom  in  this.  Self-determination  was  a  war  weapon 
and  not  a  profession  of  faith  in  an  ideal.  When  every 
nerve  was  being  strained  to  beat  Germany  to  her  knees,  it 
would  have  been  folly  to  discuss  matters  tending  to  under- 
mine the  solidarity  of  the  Entente  coalition.  But  as  the 
war  dragged  on  the  principles  proclaimed  by  Premiers 
Asquith  and  Viviani  proved  pervasive.  Much  to  the  alarm 
of  Entente  statesmen,  it  was  discovered  that  these  princi- 
ples could  not  be  limited.  They  were  advocated  by  Presi- 
dent Wilson.  They  aroused  the  hopes  of  races  subject  to 
the  Entente  powers.  The  Dublin  uprising  in  Ireland  and 
the  unrest  in  India  were  warnings  of  the  boomerang  effect 
of  using  the  weapon  of  self-determination. 

The  effort  to  blow  hot  or  blow  cold  upon  nationalist  aspi- 
rations and  irredentist  claims,  distinguishing  among  sub- 
ject peoples  on  the  sole  basis  of  expediency,  proved  to  be 
an  impossible  task  when  the  war  entered  its  fourth  year. 
The  Romanoff,  Hapsburg,  and  Ottoman  empires  were 
neighboring  states,  and  the  consideration  that  Russia  was 
a  friendly  country,  while  Austria-Hungary  and  Turkey 
were  enemy  countries,  did  not  alter  the  essential  similarity 
of  their  political  organization.  They  were  dynastic  states, 
created  by  combining  heterogeneous  peoples  under  one 
rule,  principally  through  conquest.    The  symbol  of  unity 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES  (1917-1918)        369 

was  not  a  common  national  consciousness,  but  the  ruling 
dynasty,  supported  by  a  dominant  racial  element  that  had 
not  assimilated  or  fused  with  the  subject  elements.  Artifi- 
cial frontiers  separated  peoples  who  spoke  the  same  lan- 
guage, professed  the  same  religion,  and  had  at  one  time 
enjoyed  a  common  national  existence. 

The  alien  elements  in  east  Prussia  and  Silesia  were 
Lithuanians  and  Poles,  not  Russians.  The  Finns  were  no 
more  a  separate  people  than  the  Esthonians,  Latvians,  and 
Lithuanians,  who  inhabited  the  Russian  Baltic  provinces. 
Russia  had  oppressed  the  Poles,  materially  far  more  than 
Germany  and  morally  as  much  as  Germany,  and  the  Poles 
of  Austria  had  been  treated  both  materially  and  morally 
infinitely  better  than  the  Poles  of  Russia.  The  Ukrainians 
of  Austria  could  not  be  worked  upon  by  Entente  propa- 
ganda without  stirring  up  the  other  nine  tenths  of  the 
Ukrainian  nation,  who  inhabited  southwestern  Russia. 
Rumanian  irredentism  could  not  be  limited  to  crippling 
Hungary  by  detaching  Transylvania ;  for  the  rich  Russian 
province  of  Bessarabia  was  also  Rumanian.  There  were 
more  Armenians  under  Russian  than  under  Turkish  rule. 
If  the  liberation  of  non-Turkish  elements  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire  was  the  war  aim  of  the  Entente  powers,  the  Rus- 
sian claim  to  Constantinople  was  not  so  good  as  that  of 
Greece,  and  Greece  had  priority  over  Italy  in  regard  to  the 
^gean  islands  and  the  Smyrna  region  of  Asia  Minor. 
Syrians  and  Arabs  aspired  to  freedom  and  not  to  a  change 
of  masters.  "When  the  British  decided  to  recognize  the 
independence  of  the  Hedjaz  in  order  to  make  possible  the 
conquest  of  Mesopotamia  and  Palestine,  they  discovered 
that  political  expediency  was  not  a  sufficient  excuse  for 
acknowledging  the  right  of  Arabic-speaking  Moslems  on 
the  east  side  of  the  Red  Sea  to  be  independent  and  denying 
that  right  to  a  people  of  the  same  language  and  religion, 
but  of  a  much  higher  civilization,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Red  Sea.    The  doctrine  of  self-determination,  used  by  the 


370         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

British  in  their  efforts  to  arouse  alien  elements  against  the 
Turks,  reacted  against  themselves  in  Egypt. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  world  politics,  the  champion- 
ship of  the  rights  of  small  nations  was  a  serious  blunder. 
It  was  largely  responsible  for  the  collapse  of  Russia,  and 
it  would  have  caused  the  Entente  powers  to  lose  the  war 
had  not  the  United  States  intervened.  Only  so  far  as  win- 
ning the  war  was  concerned  did  the  United  States  make  up 
for  the  defection  of  Russia.  The  Americans  could  not  be 
counted  upon  to  compensate  Great  Britain  in  Asia  and 
France  in  Europe  for  the  disappearance  of  czarist  Russia. 
Instead  of  an  accomplice  in  the  exploitation  of  Asiatic  peo- 
ples, Russia  suddenly  became  anti-imperialist  and  a  prop- 
agandist for  self-determination,  to  the  confusion  of  the 
British  in  India,  Afghanistan,  Persia,  and  Mesopotamia.^ 
From  a  cooperating  factor  in  maintaining  the  balance  of 
power  against  Germany  in  Europe,  she  was  changed  to  an 
enemy  of  *' capitalist  diplomacy,"  and  henceforth  worked 
against  the  French  policy,  born  of  necessity,  of  holding 
Germany  in  check  by  an  alliance  with  Germany's  powerful 
neighbor  on  the  east. 

The  attitude  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  towards 
the  disintegration  of  the  Hapsburg  empire  during  the  war 
was  not  harmonious,  either  as  to  means  or  ends,  and  has 
given  rise  to  much  speculation.  No  accurate  account  of  the 
divergent  policies  that  were  discussed  or  followed  can  be 
given  until  the  diplomatic  correspondence  is  published. 
We  know,  however,  from  the  unsuccessful  efforts  to  in- 
duce Austria-Hungary  to  sign  a  separate  peace,  from  the 
terms  of  the  armistice  of  November  3,  and  from  the  discus- 
sions preceding  the  final  drafting  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Ger- 
main in  the  summer  of  1919,  that  the  three  powers  whose 
common  victory  had  destroyed  the  Dual  Monarchy  and 
driven  into  exile  the  Hapsburg  dynasty  had  differing  views 
on  the  future  status  of  the  Danubian  and  Adriatic  regions, 

*  See  pp.  439-441,  447,  453-454,  468,  471-472,  501-504,  507-509. 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES  (1917-1918)         371 

British,  French,  and  Italian  statesmen  were  agreed  upon 
the  wisdom  of  encouraging  the  subject  peoples  of  the  Haps- 
burg  empire  to  revolt  against  their  Austrian  and  Hun- 
garian masters;  for  this  seemed  the  surest  method  of  de- 
priving Germany  both  of  a  reserv^oir  of  troops  and  of  her 
only  means  of  communication  with  Bulgaria  and  Turkey. 
But  all  shared  the  misgiving  of  Mr.  Lloyd  George  about 
"Balkanizing  Europe."     Although  the  immediate  advan- 
tage of  disrupting  the  Hapsburg  empire  was  indisputable 
from  a  military  point  of  view,  the  Entente  statesmen  did 
not  forget  that  the  emancipation  of  the  subject  peoples  had 
to  be  envisaged  from  the  standpoint  of  post-bellum  recon- 
struction.   Up  to  the  time  of  the  defection  of  Russia,  they 
felt  their  way  cautiously.     If  Russia  was  to  receive  the 
German  Lithuanians  of  the  Memel  region,  the  German  and 
Austrian  Poles,  and  the  Austrian  and  Hungarian  Ukrain- 
ians, and  was  to  be  the  big  sister  of  a  greatly  enlarged 
Serbia  with  an  Adriatic  littoral,  in  addition  to  Constanti- 
nople and  the  Straits  already  promised  her,  the  principal 
result  of  the  defeat  of  Germany  would  be  the  preponder- 
ance of  Russia  in  Europe  and  her  appearance  as  a  naval 
power  in  the  Mediterranean.    After  the  new  Russian  gov- 
ernment announced  its  intention  to  free  subject  races  and 
to  renounce  the  rewards  the  old  Russia  had  insisted  upon 
receiving  as  her  share  of  the  spoils,  this  source  of  embar- 
rassment and  danger  was  removed. 

It  became  possible  for  the  Entente  statesmen  to  sponsor 
the  resurrection  of  Poland.  The  obstacle  to  recognizing 
the  right  to  independence  of  the  Czecho-Slovaks  was  re- 
moved.^ The  eastern  part  of  Hungary  had  already  been 
promised  to  Rumania  and  most  of  the  Adriatic  littoral  of 
Austria  to  Italy.  British  and  French  statesmen  had  not 
up  to  this  time  believed  that  these  pledges  would  have  to 

'  The  British  and  French  governments  could  give  no  encouragement  to  the 
Czechoslovak  emissaries  in  London  and  Paris  for  fear  of  offending  Eusaia. 
The  Russian  government  had  logically  pointed  out  that  any  promises  made  to 
the  Czecho-Slovaks  would  react  to  the  disadvantage  of  Eusaia  in  Poland. 


372         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

be  met.^  They  had  felt  that  the  situation  at  the  end  of  the 
war  might  demand  a  revision  of  the  promises  in  the  trea- 
ties, and  that  it  would  be  possible  to  compromise  and  bar- 
gain in  such  a  way  as  to  revamp  the  Hapsburg  dominions 
into  a  confederation  that  would  satisfy  the  Slavs  because 
the  Austrians  and  Hungarians  were  not  to  continue  to  play 
the  role  of  masters. 

When  the  Hapsburg  dominions  could  no  longer  be  held 
together,  problems  arose  that  seemed  impossible  of  settle- 
ment except  by  new  wars  among  the  emancipated  peoples. 
As  in  the  Balkans,  the  liberated  states  had  conflicting 
claims  and  could  invoke  historical,  strategic,  ethnographic, 
and  economic  grounds  for  possessing  the  same  territories. 
The  Poles  dreamed  of  recreating  their  medieval  empire  at 
the  expense  of  Prussians,  Lithuanians,  Russians,  Ukrain- 
ians, Rumanians,  and  Czecho-Slovaks.  The  Teschen  dis- 
trict of  upper  Silesia  was  claimed  by  Poles  and  Czecho- 
slovaks, eastern  Gahcia  by  Poles  and  Ukrainians,  and  the 
banat  of  Temesvar  by  Rumanians  and  Serbians. 

The  two  most  important  problems  in  the  application  of 
the  principle  of  self-determination  to  the  Hapsburg  domin- 
ions were  those  affecting  the  future  of  Austria  and  the  sat- 
isfaction of  Italian  aspirations.  Both  had  been  recognized, 
since  the  beginning  of  the  World  War,  as  full  of  danger  for 
the  future  relations  among  the  great  powers,  because  their 
solution  involved  changes  in  the  European  balance  of 
power. 

Even  if  Italian  and  Czecho-Slovak  claims  were  fully  al- 
lowed in  the  settlement  following  the  war,  there  would  still 
be  between  seven  and  eight  million  Austrian-Germans  in 
territory  contiguous  to  Germany.    If  the  principle  of  self- 

^  They  repeatedly  said  as  much  to  M.  Vesnitch,  Serbian  minister  at  Paris. 
Rumanian  statesmen  have  told  me  that  they  felt  they  were  being  ' '  double- 
crossed  ' '  in  the  negotiations  for  the  fulfilment  of  promises  made  to  them  in 
1916.  Proof  of  the  fact  that  agreements  signed  under  the  stress  of  necessity 
are  not  taken  too  seriously  by  governments  is  to  be  found  in  a  comparison 
of  the  Sykes-Picot  agreement  and  the  Anglo-Hedjaz  treaty.  See  pp.  437- 
440. 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES   (1917-19]8)         373 

determination  were  applied  to  the  German  element  in  the 
Hapsburg  empire,  the  richest  prize  of  the  war  would  fall  to 
Germany.  The  vanquished  power  would  be  more  than 
compensated  for  her  losses  to  France,  Belgium,  Denmark, 
and  Poland  by  the  acquisition  of  these  millions  and  a  fer- 
tile territory  extending  along  the  Danube,  with  the  third 
city  of  Europe  as  its  capital.  The  French  were  determined 
that  no  such  contingency  should  ever  arise,  and  when  it  was 
realized  that  the  Hapsburg  dominions  could  not  be  held 
together,  French  diplomacy  asserted  that  the  permanent 
political  separation  of  Austria  and  Germany  was  not  a 
matter  to  be  discussed  after  the  war.  Despite  the  conse- 
quences to  the  Austrians,  their  exclusion  from  Germany 
was  to  be  a  basic  and  unalterable  fact  in  the  reconstruction 
of  Europe.  Far-seeing  Frenchmen,  however,  beheved  that 
it  might  prove  impossible,  whatever  were  the  treaty  stipu- 
lations, to  prevent  the  union  of  Austria  with  Germany. 
Consequently  there  was  a  tendency  in  France  during  the 
war  to  attempt  to  save  Austria-Hungary,  and  proposals 
for  a  separate  peace  were  both  made  and  entertained  with 
that  object  in  view. 

Great  Britain,  on  the  other  hand,  was  not  alarmed  over 
the  possibility  of  the  incorporation  of  the  German-speaking 
portions  of  Austria  with  Germany.  This  contingency  did 
not  affect  her  security  as  it  affected  the  security  of  France ; 
it  might  even  prove  advantageous  to  her  commerce.  Italy 
felt  that  she  had  less  to  fear  from  the  Germans  than  from 
the  Russians,  and  the  thought  of  the  union  of  Austria  with 
Germany  was  not  disturbing.  As  a  neighbor  Italy  could 
not  help  but  benefit  by  the  prosperity  of  Austria  shorn 
of  military  power,  and  if  that  prosperity  were  dependent 
upon  union  with  Germany  it  would  benefit  Italy  to  have 
the  union  effected. 

The  difference  of  policy  during  the  war  between  France 
and  Italy  in  regard  to  the  Hapsburg  dominions  is  a  strik- 
ing illustration  of  how  allied  peoples,  fighting  a  common 


374         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

enemy,  have  in  mind  and  advance  antagonistic  aims  because 
their  situation  and  their  interests  are  ditferent.  France's 
great  enemy  was  the  Hohenzollern  empire;  Italy's  great 
enemy  was  the  Hapsburg  empire.  To  prevent  Germany 
from  inheriting  any  portion  of  it,  France  was  ready  to  pre- 
serve the  Hapsburg  empire.  Because  her  own  prosperity 
was  in  a  measure  dependent  upon  the  prosperity  of  central 
Europe,  Italy  was  ready  to  preserve  the  Hohenzollern  em- 
pire. Fearing  Germany,  France  wanted  to  detach  from 
Germany  all  the  territory  she  could,  thus  lessening  her 
man  power  and  sources  of  wealth.  In  order  to  dispose  of 
the  nightmare  of  a  strong  political  organism,  which  had 
always  impeded  her  growth  and  had  preyed  upon  her,  Italy 
believed  that  the  annexation  of  German-speaking  Austria 
(after  she  had  taken  her  part)  to  Germany  might  be  the 
best  way  of  forestalling  for  all  time  any  scheme  to  revive 
the  Hapsburg  empire.  The  French,  intent  upon  destroying 
Germany,  regarded  Austrians  and  Hungarians  with  toler- 
ance and,  having  nothing  to  fear  from  Austria-Hungary, 
did  not  see  why  the  territories  of  the  Dual  Monarchy  should 
not  be  reorganized  politically  and  remain  a  unit.  The  Ital- 
ians, intent  upon  destroying  Austria-Hungary,  deplored 
the  fact  that  they  had  to  fight  Germany  also,  and,  having 
nothing  to  fear  from  Germany,  were  willing  to  see  the  Ger- 
mans rehabilitated  and  even  strengthened.^ 

When  the  moment  for  drawing  up  .armistice  terms  ar- 
rived, Italy  held  to  the  letter  of  her  secret  treaty  of  1915. 
She  insisted  upon  occupying  the  Austrian  Tyrol  up  to  the 
Brenner  Pass,  the  ports  and  hinterland  of  the  head  of  the 
Adriatic,  and  ports  and  islands  of  Dalmatia.  Her  object 
was  not  to  take  military  precautions  to  insure  the  unques- 
tioned acceptance  of  the  defeat  by  the  vanquished  enemy, 
but  to  stamp  out  Serbian  nationalism  in  the  regions  she 
purposed  annexing  to  Italy.  By  occupying  Fiume  the  Ital- 
ians went  beyond  the  terms  of  the  1915  treaty.     These 

»See  pp.  450-451, 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES  (1917-1918)        375 

moves  had  long  been  feared  by  the  Serbians,  and  they 
proved  that  the  instinct  of  the  Jugo-Slavs  of  Austria  and 
Hungary  to  support  the  Hapsburg  empire  against  Italy 
had  been  justified.  The  Italians  still  farther  limited  the 
application  of  the  principle  of  self-determination.  Entente 
statesmen  had  declared  that  only  the  peoples  subject  to 
enemies  of  the  Entente  were  to  enjoy  this  right.  With  the 
consent  of  the  British  and  French,  the  Italians  made  a 
reservation  even  to  this  narrow  limitation  of  the  doctrine : 
Self-determination  was  to  be  exercised  by  peoples  subject 
to  enemy  domination  only  in  the  case  of  territories  not 
coveted  and  claimed  by  any  of  the  great  powers.  Where 
one  of  the  liberators  was  concerned,  there  was  to  be  simply 
a  change  of  masters. 

Hard  pressed  by  Germany,  and  not  sure  of  victory,  the 
Entente  powers  in  the  spring  of  1918  began  to  encourage 
ofiQcially  the  aspirations  of  the  Poles,  Czecho-Slovaks,  Jugo- 
Slavs,  and  Rumanians.  They  entered  into  relations  with 
national  committees  that  had  long  been  formed  and  had 
sent  their  representatives  to  London,  Paris,  Rome,  and 
Washington.  Special  treatment  was  accorded  Austro- 
Hungarian  prisoners  of  war  of  Slavic  blood,  and  when  they 
could  be  induced  to  do  so,  they  were  formed  into  regiments 
to  fight  against  former  comrades-in-arms.  In  August  and 
September  the  Czecho-Slovaks  were  recognized  as  allies 
and  belligerents,  and  on  October  17,  1918,  the  Czech  Re- 
public was  proclaimed  at  Prague.  The  Polish  nationalist 
army  was  recognized  by  the  allied  and  associated  powers 
in  October,  and  when  the  Germans  quit  Poland  the  Warsaw 
government  informed  Austria,  on  November  8,  1918,  that 
Galicia  had  been  incorporated  in  Poland.  Transylvanians 
proclaimed  their  union  with  Rumania  and  Jugo-Slavs  their 
union  with  Serbia  during  the  last  days  of  the  Dual  ^lon- 
archy.  But  the  Jugo-Slavs  had  never  received  satisfaction 
from  the  Entente  powers  as  to  the  status  and  territorial 
limits  of  their  nation.    After  the  armistice  they  discovered, 


376         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

what  they  had  long  suspected,  that  Great  Britain  and 
France  were  bound  by  explicit  engagements  to  sacrifice 
most  of  the  Slovenes  and  a  part  of  the  Croats  and  Dal- 
matians to  Italy. 

With  the  exception  of  the  Czecho-Slovaks,  there  is  doubt 
as  to  the  contribution  of  the  subject  peoples  of  Austria  and 
Hungary  to  the  hastening  of  the  victory  of  the  Entente 
powers  over  the  central  empires.  But  once  the  military 
power  of  the  Hohenzollerns  and  Hapsburgs  was  manifestly 
broken,  the  effects  of  the  self-determination  propaganda 
were  immediately  evident.  The  disintegration  of  the  Dual 
Monarchy  took  place  automatically  and  almost  without 
bloodshed. 

In  1914,  when  they  realized  that  Turkey  was  considering 
joining  the  central  empires,  the  Entente  ambassadors  at 
Constantinople  offered  to  maintain  the  integrity  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire  in  exchange  for  Ottoman  neutrality. 
They  promised  not  to  countenance  or  recognize  any  na- 
tional movement  within  the  dominions  of  the  sultan.  A 
fortnight  later,  when  this  bribe  seemed  to  have  no  effect, 
they  tried  intimidation,  and  warned  the  Turks  that  if  they 
joined  Germany  they  would  lose  the  territories  where  there 
were  non-Turkish  elements.  These  negotiations  prove  that 
the  self-determination  propaganda  of  the  Entente  powers, 
as  applied  to  the  Near  East,  was  inspired  by  the  same  pol- 
icy of  expediency  as  their  support  of  small  nations  else- 
where. 

When  Turkey  joined  the  central  empires,  the  Entente 
powers  were  free  to  use  the  weapon  of  self-determination 
as  a  war  measure  to  destroy  the  integrity  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  although  two  members  of  the  Entente  had  fought 
the  third  to  maintain  it  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury. There  was  no  desire,  however,  to  carry  out  the  threat 
and  to  preach  in  the  Near  East  the  doctrine  in  defense  of 
which  they  professed  to  be  fighting  in  Europe.  From  the 
beginning  of  the  w^ar  the  diplomacy  of  the  Entente  powers 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES  (1917-1918)         377 

in  the  Ottoman  Empire  followed  its  traditional  course.  If 
Turkey  had  to  go  by  the  board  there  would  be  no  emanci- 
pation of  subject  races,  but  a  division  of  the  Ottoman  Em- 
pire into  spheres  of  influence.  The  encouragement  of  as- 
pirations to  independence  on  the  part  of  Mohammedan 
peoples  was  contrary  to  the  general  interests  of  Great  Brit- 
ain and  France  in  Asia  and  Africa.  Because  of  the  diffi- 
culties of  division,  and  because  of  the  sentiments  of  soli- 
darity with  the  Turks  of  their  own  Moslem  subjects,  the 
British  and  the  French  would  have  preferred  to  see  the 
Ottoman  Empire  kept  intact,  despite  the  aid  and  comfort 
Turkey  was  giving  to  their  enemies.  But  Russia  and  Italy 
had  to  be  rewarded,  and  if  this  were  done  the  other  two 
powers  must  have  their  compensations.  Present  British 
and  French  possessions  and  economic  interests  had  to  be 
protected  and  the  balance  of  power  preserved  in  the  Near 
East. 

Greece,  part  of  the  time  with  the  powerful  voice  of 
Venizelos,  spoke  for  the  Greeks  of  the  Ottoman  Empire, 
who  were  persecuted,  exiled,  and  massacred  during  the  war 
in  a  manner  scarcely  less  thorough  than  that  applied  to  the 
Armenians.  The  massacre  and  deportation  of  the  Ar- 
menians was  unparalleled.  The  Syrians,  too,  were  preyed 
upon.  But  the  Christian  peoples  of  the  Ottoman  Empire 
received  no  encouragement  or  protection  from  the  Entente 
powers.  Russian,  Italian,  and  French  ambitions  could  not 
be  realized  without  the  sacrifice  of  the  Greeks  and  the  Ar- 
menians. They  were,  therefore,  sacrificed.  As  these  pow- 
ers were  against  Greek  and  Armenian  nationalism,  and  as 
Great  Britain  had  no  interests  in  the  parts  of  Turkey  in- 
habited by  Christian  peoples,  the  armistice  with  Turkey, 
after  the  complete  victory,  made  no  provision  for  their 
protection  or  liberation.  A  fitting  epitaph  for  the  tomb  of 
more  than  a  million  Christians  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  who 
were  fired  with  hope  because  of  the  proclamations  of  the 
ideals  of  the  Entente,  and  whose  devotion  to  the  enemies 


378         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

of  Germany  was  not  reciprocated,  would  be,  ''They  lost 
their  lives  because  they  were  loyal  to  those  who  could  have 
saved  them." 

Ideals  and  sentiments  of  humanity  have  no  place  in 
world  politics.  While  the  Greeks  and  Armenians  were  suf- 
fering, the  Entente  powers  carried  on  protracted  negotia- 
tions over  the  future  of  the  Ottoman  dominions.  The 
Anglo-French  agreements  of  1915  and  1916  defined  even- 
tual rights  of  Russia  and  Italy.  In  return  for  Constanti- 
nople, the  ^gean  islands,  the  Smyrna  and  Adalia  regions, 
and  southern  Asia  Minor  as  far  east  as  Konia,  Russia,  and 
Italy  agreed  to  leave  eastern  Asia  Minor,  Syria,  Palestine, 
and  Mesopotamia  to  the  French  and  the  British.  In  1916 
two  officials,  whose  names  the  arrangement  bears,  settled 
conflicting  French  and  British  claims  by  a  compromise 
known  as  the  Sykes-Picot  agreement.  Southeastern  Asia 
Minor,  Cilicia,  and  Syria  went  to  France;  and  Palestine, 
the  Sinai  peninsula,  and  Mesopotamia,  to  Great  Britain. 
The  dividing  lines  were  settled  after  long  and  bitter  dis- 
cussions in  which  oil  and  copper,  and  not  the  necessities  or 
wishes  of  the  peoples  concerned,  were  the  guiding  consid- 
erations. 

The  intervention  of  Bulgaria  on  the  side  of  the  central 
empires,  the  failure  of  the  Dardanelles  expedition,  the  dis- 
aster that  befell  the  British  army  in  Mesopotamia,  and  the 
attempt  of  the  Turks  to  invade  Egypt  by  crossing  the  Suez 
Canal  opened  the  eyes  of  the  Entente  powers  to  the  dangers 
of  the  Turkish  situation.  Turkey  showed  no  signs  of  suc- 
cumbing and  made  no  move  to  sue  for  a  separate  peace. 
The  disaster  to  Russian  arms  in  Europe  and  the  stalemate 
on  the  French  front  contributed  to  diminish  the  prestige  of 
the  Entente  in  the  Near  East. 

The  situation  was  particularly  serious  for  Great  Britain, 
who  was  compelled  to  put  forth  every  effort  and  use  every 
means  to  reestablish  her  military  reputation.  Unless  they 
showed  that  they  could  drive  the  Turks  out  of  Bagdad  and 


DISINTEGRATION  OF  EMPIRES  (1917-1918)         379 

Jerusalem,  the  British  would  have  to  face  troubles  in 
Egypt  and  India  and  the  loss  of  all  influence  in  Arabia 
(where  the  holding  of  Aden  was  important),  in  Persia, 
and  in  Afghanistan.  British  statesmen  and  military  lead- 
ers are  not  in  the  habit  of  fooling  themselves.  They  saw 
that  in  Mesopotamia  and  Arabia  they  would  have  to  use 
the  natives  to  fight  the  Turks,  and  that  no  military  opera- 
tion on  a  large  scale,  bringing  decisive  results,  would  be 
possible  without  the  cooperation  of  the  Arabs.  AVhen  this 
fact  was  recognized,  prodigal  promises  of  independence 
were  made  to  all  the  important  sheiks  of  Mesopotamia, 
and  the  shereef  of  Mecca  was  induced  to  revolt  against  the 
sultan.  In  return  the  independence  of  the  Hedjaz  was 
promulgated,  with  the  shereef  as  King  Hussein.  Self-de- 
termination for  the  Arabs  was  preached,  and  this  propa- 
ganda, the  boldest  and  most  picturesque  during  the  World 
War,  resulted  in  the  conquest  of  Mesopotamia  and  Pales- 
tine by  the  British. 

The  British  intended  to  use  the  national  movement 
among  the  Arabs  only  as  a  means,  and  not  to  allow  it  to 
grow  to  irresistible  proportions.  To  keep  the  Suez  Canal 
under  their  protection,  and  to  set  up  a  barrier  between  the 
Arabs  of  Mesopotamia,  Arabia,  and  Syria,  and  the  Arabs 
of  Egypt,  the  London  government  conceived  the  idea  of 
utilizing  the  Zionist  movement.  On  November  2,  1917, 
Foreign  Secretary  Balfour  issued  a  statement  declaring 
that  the  British  government  was  in  sjmapathy  with  Zionism 
and  would  aid  the  Zionists  to  set  up  a  national  home  for  all 
the  Jews  in  Palestine.  A  few  months  earlier,  to  propitiate 
the  Arabs  of  the  Hedjaz,  the  British  had  promised  them 
Damascus,  which  had  been  assigned  to  France  in  the  Anglo- 
French  agreement  of  the  previous  year. 

The  Hedjaz  movement  was  the  only  one  that  was  recog- 
nized by  the  Entente  powers.  The  belligerency  of  the 
Hedjaz  was  proclaimed,  and  its  representatives  attended 
the  peace  conference  as  delegates  of  a  sovereign  state.    The 


380  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

other  subject  peoples  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  were  denied  a 
hearing  at  Paris,  as  their  fate  had  already  been  settled  by 
the  series  of  agreements  among  the  victors.  The  Ottoman 
Empire  succumbed  to  the  undermining  influence  of  the  self- 
determination  propaganda,  but  the  applications  of  the  prin- 
ciple was  limited  to  a  far  greater  extent  than  in  the  Haps- 
burg  empire.  Only  that  non-Turkish  element  whose  aid 
had  been  needed  during  the  war  was  liberated.  The  others 
went  from  one  subjection  to  another. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

THE  ATTEMPT  TO  CKEATE  A  LEAGUE  OF  NATIONS  AT  PARIS 
AFTER  THE  DEFEAT  OF  GERMANY  (1919) 

TO  the  peace  conference,  which  met  at  Paris  in  January, 
1919,  were  invited  representatives  of  all  the  nations 
that  had  been  at  war,  with  one  or  more  of  the  members  of 
the  central  empires  coalition.  It  was  not  the  intention  of 
Entente  statesmen,  however,  to  let  pass  out  of  their  hands 
either  the  initiative  or  the  final  decision  in  regard  to  mat- 
ters arising  at  the  conference.  And,  as  their  object  was 
primarily  to  harmonize  the  conflicting  interests  and  ideals 
of  the  Entente  powers  and  the  United  States,  and  not  to 
reestablish  a  state  of  peace  between  the  victors  and  the 
vanquished,  the  central  empires  and  their  allies  were  ex- 
cluded from  the  conference.  From  the  beginning  the  or- 
ganizers of  the  conference  arbitrarily  divided  the  mem- 
bers of  the  victorious  coalition  into  two  groups,  "the  five 
Principal  Allied  and  Associated  Powers  with  general  in- 
terests" and  *Uhe  Secondary  States  with  particular  inter- 
ests." Russia,  who  had  withdrawn  from  the  war  after  the 
Bolshevist  regime  superseded  the  original  revolutionary 
government,  was  left  outside  altogether. 

Power  and  resources,  not  numbers  and  contribution  to 
the  victory,  decided  the  category  in  which  each  member  of 
the  coalition  was  placed.  The  actual  sacrifices  of  Japan 
and  the  United  States,  who  were  classified  as  "Principal 
AlHed  and  Associated  Powers,"  had  not  been  as  great  as 
those  of  Belgium,  Serbia,  and  Rumania.  It  was  also  patent 
that  from  the  point  of  view  of  future  prosperity  and  secur- 

381 


382         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ity  only  France  and  Italy  among  the  big  five  had  as  much 
at  stake  in  the  various  settlements  as  the  minor  European 
members  of  the  coalition.  The  treaties  were  made  by  the 
great  powers,  who  decided  among  themselves,  in  accord- 
ance with  their  own  interests,  every  question  that  arose. 
Only  six  plenary  sessions  were  held  during  the  framing  of 
the  two  principal  treaties,  and  the  texts  of  the  treaties  were 
not  communicated  to  the  smaller  states  or  to  the  enemy 
states  until  the  statesmen  of  the  five  principal  powers  had 
definitely  agreed  upon  terms  that  amounted  to  the  har- 
monizing of  their  own  ideas  and  the  compromising  of  their 
own  interests.  At  the  second  plenary  session,  when  the 
statesmen  of  the  smaller  powers  protested  against  this 
high-handed  method  of  procedure,  M.  Clemenceau,  speak- 
ing for  his  colleagues  of  the  Entente  and  for  President 
Wilson,  refused  to  entertain  the  protest  on  the  ground  that 
the  great  powers,  whose  authority  was  supported  by  twelve 
million  soldiers,  must  control  the  conference.^ 

At  the  end  of  May,  when  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain,  to 
be  presented  to  Austria,  was  laid  before  a  plenary  session, 
the  premiers  of  the  small  states  most  affected  by  its  terms 
renewed  the  protest  against  the  injustice  of  drafting  docu- 
ments that  were  to  have  a  vital  bearing  upon  their  national 
destinies  without  giving  them  a  voice  in  the  deliberations 
or  decisions.  Again  the  doctrine  of  the  great  powers  was 
set  forth,  this  time  by  President  Wilson,  to  the  effect  that 
those  who  possessed  superior  strength  and  resources  had 
the  right  to  judge  what  was  best  for  weaker  nations.  It 
was  understood,  of  course,  that  in  forming  their  judgments 

*  "  As  events  turned  out,  the  great  powers  kept  matters  in  their  own  hands 
to  a  much  greater  extent  than  was  anticipated  at  the  opening  of  the  confer- 
ence, and  the  bulk  of  the  treaty  was  made  by  them  alone,  and  only  presented 
to  their  smaller  allies  when  the  time  for  signature  came.  .  .  .  An  attempt 
of  the  small  powers  to  assert  their  rights  was  nipped  in  the  bud  at  the 
Bccond  meeting.  The  natural  result  was  that  the  plenary  conference  played 
only  a  formal  part  in  the  organization. "  "A  History  of  the  Peace  Conference 
of  Paris"   (Institute  of  international  Affairs,  London),  i,  p.  249. 


ATTEMPT  TO  CREATE  LEAGUE  OF  NATIONS  (1919)  383 

the  strong  would  exercise  wisdom  and  justice  and  disin- 
terestedness. 

The  organization  and  methods  of  the  Paris  peace  confer- 
ence must  be  taken  into  consideration  in  appraising  the 
attempt  to  create  a  league  of  nations.  It  was  inevitable  that 
the  character  of  the  League  of  Nations,  whatever  had  been 
its  original  conception,  should  undergo  a  modification  when 
drafted  under  such  conditions,  and  that  its  final  organiza- 
tion should  conform  to  the  general  spirit  and  purposes  of 
the  treaties.  The  idealistic  principle  of  equality  of  nations 
was  denied  by  the  conference.  In  its  place  was  put  a  realis- 
tic conception  of  the  privileges  and  obligations  of  five  great 
powers  that  had  waged  a  war  and  won  a  victory  in  common 
and  who  were  determined  to  make  an  effort  to  arrive  at  a 
peace  settlement  that  would  confirm  and  maintain  indefi- 
nitely their  privileged  position.  It  was  natural,  therefore, 
that  the  covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations  should  provide 
for  a  council  of  nine  members,  five  (the  majority)  being 
designated  as  permanent  members  and  four  (the  minority) 
being  elected  members.  Great  Britain,  France,  Italy,  Ja- 
pan, and  the  United  States  were  given  the  permanent  seats, 
and  all  the  other  nations  were  to  fill  from  their  number 
the  minority  seats.  Every  nation  was  to  have  a  place  in 
the  Assembly  of  the  league.  But  the  real  power  was  vested 
in  the  Council. 

Along  with  the  thought  of  safeguarding  the  authority  of 
the  five  great  powers,  the  framers  of  the  covenant  had  to 
keep  in  mind  the  unwillingness  of  the  great  powers  to  be 
automatically  party  to  any  common  action  that  any  one  of 
them  might  deem  prejudicial  to  its  individual  interests, 
or  that  would  deprive  a  great  power  of  the  advantage  of 
its  superior  strength  in  a  dispute  with  a  small  power. 
These  two  inconveniences,  which  formed — on  the  technical 
ground  of  sovereignty — powerful  objections  to  an  interna- 
tional organization,  were  remedied  by  inserting  a  clause 


384         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

giving  each  member  of  the  Council  the  right  of  veto  and  by 
making  voluntary  the  submission  of  disputes  to  the  inter- 
national court  provided  for  in  article  XIV.^ 

In  the  question  of  the  League  of  Nations,  as  in  many 
other  questions,  an  honest  effort  was  made  to  advance  the 
cause  of  world  peace  by  providing  a  machinery  that  would 
lessen  the  chances  of  another  war  breaking  out  in  the  same 
manner  as  the  war  of  1914,  There  was  also  the  desire  to 
set  up  an  international  organization  that  would  take  care 
of  a  host  of  minor  matters  of  an  international  character 
and  that  would  facilitate  cooperation  after  the  war  among 
the  various  powers  in  dealing  with  problems  affecting  their 
relations  with  one  another  and  with  smaller  states.  And 
statesmen  were  sensitive  to  public  opinion,  which  demanded 
that  they  devise  at  Paris  some  means  of  improving  inter- 
national relations.  Most  of  the  advocates  of  the  League 
of  Nations  idea  argued  at  the  time  and  have  reiterated 
since  that  the  important  thing  was  to  make  a  real  start 
along  the  road  of  international  association ;  and  they  there- 
fore emphasize  the  fact  that  a  league  of  nations  was  created 
at  Paris  and  has  been  functioning  since.  Its  impotence  in 
the  things  that  count,  however,  they  do  not  seem  to  see, 
and  they  refuse  to  admit  that  the  defects  in  the  original 
covenant  make  its  amendment  impossible.  The  clause,  ''no 
such  amendment  shall  bind  any  member  of  the  League  which 
signifies  its  dissent  therefrom"  (article  XXVI),  prevents 
the  League  from  developing  into  what  President  Wilson 
declared  that  it  must  be — "an  association  of  all  nations  for 
the  common  good  of  all" — and  from  fulfilling  the  sole 
function  that  will  diminish  the  chances  of  war  arising  from 
international  disputes — compulsory  submission  of  quarrels 
to  an  international  court. 

*  The  right  of  veto  waa  rather  a  right  of  withdrawal,  but,  in  numerous 
speeches  in  defense  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  Mr.  Wilson  interpreted  it  as  a 
veto  right  and  emphasized  the  stipulations  of  the  covenant  that  enabled  any 
member  of  the  League  to  avoid  surrendering  its  sovereign  rights.  He  thereby 
admitted  that  membership  in  the  League  did  not  mean  that  a  state  would  ever 
have  to  act  against  ita  own  interests. 


ATTEMPT  TO  CREATE  LEAGUE  OF  NATIONS  (1919)  385 

The  study  of  world  politics  shows  us  how  nations,  when 
they  have  become  strong,  have  invariably  been  a  law  unto 
themselves,  have  developed  and  maintained  armies  and 
navies  on  the  plea  of  necessity  for  national  security,  and 
have  then  used  this  power  to  advance  their  commercial  in- 
terests by  the  exploitation  of  weaker  peoples  and  to  impose 
upon  all  who  could  not  resist  them  their  own  interpretation 
of  moot  questions. 

At  Paris  the  weaker  powers  were  unanimously  in  favor 
of  a  league  of  nations  based  upon  equality  of  opportunity 
to  secure  justice  in  international  disputes,  equality  of  op- 
portunity to  participate  in  world  markets,  and  reciprocity 
in  all  international  dealings.  A  covenant  that  would  have 
secured  these  advantages  was  what  President  Wilson  had 
in  mind,  but  it  was  impossible  to  get  any  great  power  to 
surrender  the  advantages  of  its  privileged  position  in  deal- 
ing with  other  nations.  The  original  covenant  draft  was 
modified  accordingly,  with  the  result  that  the  League  of 
Nations,  as  embodied  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  does  not 
bind  the  great  powers  to  deal  justly  with  the  other  states 
or  even  with  each  other.^ 

It  was  generally  supposed  in  the  United  States  that  the 
Entente  statesmen,  with  few  exceptions,  were  opposed  to 
the  League  of  Nations,  or  at  least  to  having  it  incorporated 
in  the  treaty  of  Versailles.  The  picture  of  President  Wil- 
son forcing  the  covenant  upon  an  unwilling  conference,  and 
saving  it  after  it  had  been  sidetracked,  is  pure  fancy.    It 

^  Compulsory  arbitration  or  reference  of  moot  questions  to  an  international 
tribunal,  which  was  the  original  idea,  received  drastic  emasculation  in  articles 
XIII  and  XIV,  and  wus  further  weakened  by  the  provision  of  article  XV  that 
any  recommendation  of  the  Council  in  the  matter  of  a  dispute  would  have 
to  be  unanimous  to  be  binding.  In  article  XIII  disputes  had  to  be  of  a  kind 
that  the  parties  ' '  recognize  to  be  suitable  for  submission  to  arbitration, ' ' 
and  in  a  paragraph  defining  what  kind  of  disputes  are  suitable  the  word 
' '  generally ' '  was  inserted  before  ' '  suitable. ' '  Article  XIV  does  not  establish 
but  merely  provides  for  "plans  for  the  establishment"  of  a  permanent  court 
of  international  justice;  the  said  court  is  simply  "competent  to  hear  and 
determine  any  dispute  of  an  international  character  which  the  parties 
thereto  submit  to  it " ;  and  its  opinion  upon  disputes  or  questions  deferred 
to  it  by  the  Council  or  the  Assembly  is  only  ' '  advisory. ' ' 


386         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WOELD  POLITICS 

is  true  that  Mr.  Wilson,  like  Lord  Robert  Cecil  and  Gen- 
eral Smuts,  had  pronounced  ideas  in  regard  to  the  cove- 
nant, and  that  after  a  draft  was  agreed  upon  he  regarded 
the  league  as  the  most  important  feature  of  the  treaties. 
But  the  covenant,  as  it  appears  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles, 
was  prepared  in  fifteen  sessions  of  the  commission  in- 
trusted with  its  drafting,  ten  of  which  in  the  first  half  of 
February  produced  the  draft  submitted  to  the  plenary  ses- 
sion of  February  14,  while  the  other  five,  between  IMarch 
22  and  April  11,  completed  its  revision.  The  commission 
began  its  work  with  certain  definite  limitations,  and  did  not 
attempt  to  include  in  the  covenant  the  conceptions  of  inter- 
national association  as  advocated  by  idealists.  When  it 
came  to  controversial  points,  like  article  X  and  article 
XXII,  it  accepted  the  compromises  decided  upon  by  the 
heads  of  states  in  secret  conference  and  communicated  to 
it.  The  spirit  shown  by  the  members  of  the  commission 
was  an  eminently  practical  one.  They  avoided  a  discus- 
sion of  proposals  that  they  knew  their  governments  would 
not  accept,  and  they  did  their  work  in  the  same  way  as  the 
other  commissions,  i.  e.,  by  embodying  in  a  text  the  de- 
cisions arrived  at  by  the  Council  of  Ten  or  the  *^Big  Four" 
in  every  clause  where  there  was  a  conflict  of  interest  or 
policy  among  the  great  powers. 

Far  from  being  opposed  to  the  League  of  Nations  and  its 
inclusion  in  the  treaty,  the  Entente  statesmen  looked  upon 
it  as  an  excellent  means  of  solving  problems,  and  of  secur- 
ing guaranties  and  help  from  the  rest  of  the  world  in  en- 
forcing treaty  clauses  that  were  to  their  own  particular  ad- 
vantage. Article  X  guaranteed  the  territorial  status  quo 
of  the  treaties.  Article  XXII  provided  for  the  annexation 
of  the  German  colonies  and  a  division  of  the  Ottoman  Em- 
pire, under  the  guise  of  mandates  held  by  the  new  pos- 
sessors as  trustees  of  the  League  of  Nations.  Equality  of 
treatment  commercially  in  mandated  territories  was  guar- 
anteed only  to  members  of  the  league,  thus  excluding  Ger- 


ATTEMPT  TO  CREATE  LEAGUE  OF  NATIONS  (1919)  387 

many  from  the  markets  of  her  former  possessions  and  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire.^ 

In  addition  to  these  provisions,  which  have  to  do  with  the 
covenant  alone,  the  treaties  intrusted  to  the  league  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  Saar  Basin  and  the  duty  of  revising, 
at  a  later  date,  certain  articles  relating  to  inland  transpor- 
tation that  encroached  upon  elementary  rights  of  sover- 
eignty. In  this  way  the  execution  of  the  treaties  was  bound 
up  with  the  League  of  Nations,  and  upon  neutrals,  by  the 
fact  of  their  entrance  in  the  league,  was  imposed  the  obli- 
gation of  aiding  in  forcing  the  defeated  powers  to  carry 
out  treaty  provisions  that  had  been  dictated  to  them  and 
were  conceived  in  the  interest  of  a  limited  number  of  states. 

Criticism  of  the  League  of  Nations,  especially  in  the 
United  States,  where  it  became  an  issue  of  internal  party 
politics,  was  bitter  and  unreasoning,  and  brought  forth 
equally  bitter  and  unreasoning  defense.  It  is  difficult  to 
find  any  story  or  critical  estimate  of  the  League  of  Nations 
(or  of  the  work  of  the  Paris  peace  conference  on  the  whole) 
that  is  not  a  polemic.  The  experience  of  three  years  has 
demonstrated,  however,  the  apparent  futility  of  the  league 
as  an  instrument  for  accomplishing  the  objects  that  Mr. 
Wilson  and  other  idealists  had  in  mind  as  the  purpose  of 
its  existence.  Speaking  on  September  27,  1918,  Mr.  Wilson 
said : 

**It  will  be  necessary  that  all  who  sit  down  at  the  peace 
table  shall  come  ready  and  able  to  pay  the  price,  the  only 
price  that  will  procure  a  secure  and  lasting  peace,  and 
ready  and  willing  to  create  in  some  virile  fashion  the  only 
instrumentality  by  which  it  can  be  made  certain  that  the 
agreements  of  the  peace  shall  be  honored  and  fulfilled. 
That  price  is  impartial  justice  in  every  item  of  the  settle- 
ment, no  matter  whose  interest  is  crossed,  and  not  only 

^  Of  course,  Germany  can  be  admitted  to  the  League  of  Nations,  but 
France  has  the  power  to  prevent  her  admittance,  and  the  French  government 
has  declared  in  speeches  of  successive  premiers  before  the  Chamber  of  Deputies 
that  it  will  oppose  the  candidacy  of  Germany  until  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of 
.VersaiUes  are  fulfilled,  which  will  take  at  least  thirty  years. 


388  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

impartial  justice,  but  also  the  satisfaction  of  the  several 
peoples  whose  fortunes  are  dealt  with.  That  indispensable 
instrumentality  is  a  league  of  nations,  formed  under  cove- 
nants. .  .  .  The  impartial  justice  meted  out  must  involve 
no  discrimination  between  those  to  whom  we  wish  to  be 
just  and  those  to  whom  we  do  not  wish  to  be  just.  It  must 
be  a  justice  that  plays  no  favorites  and  knows  no  standards 
but  the  equal  rights  of  the  several  peoples  concerned.  No 
special  or  separate  interest  of  any  single  nation  or  any 
group  of  nations  can  be  made  the  basis  of  any  part  of  the 
settlement  which  is  not  consistent  with  the  common  interest 
of  all" 

Although  Mr.  Wilson  changed  his  mind  as  to  the  prac- 
ticability of  an  association  of  nations  and  a  peace  settle- 
ment along  the  lines  indicated  in  his  war  speeches,  the  wis- 
dom of  his  earlier  opinions  seems  to  have  been  demon- 
strated by  events. 

After  the  signing  of  the  treaties,  of  which  the  covenant 
of  the  League  of  Nations  formed  the  first  articles,  prepara- 
tions were  made  for  organizing  the  secretariat,  which  was 
installed  first  at  London  and  then  at  Geneva.  Between 
January  16  and  October  28,  1920,  the  Council  of  the  League 
held  ten  sessions  at  London,  Paris,  Rome,  San  Sebastian, 
and  Brussels.  But,  both  in  personnel  of  the  delegates  and 
in  the  importance  of  the  matters  passed  upon,  it  was  evi- 
dent that  the  Entente  powers  did  not  intend  to  use  the 
League  as  the  organization  through  which  the  principal 
questions  concerning  the  application  of  the  treaties  and  the 
problems  arising  from  the  war  were  to  be  settled.  Vital 
matters  were  taken  up  in  conferences  of  the  premiers  of 
Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy,  who  decided  upon  the 
terms  of  the  treaty  with  Turkey,  which  had  not  been  set- 
tled by  the  Paris  conference,  and  all  other  matters  impor- 
tant enough  to  affect  the  interests  and  relations  of  the  three 
powers.  Other  questions  were  referred  to  a  council  of 
ambassadors  in  London  or  in  Paris.  The  Council  of  the 
League,  attended  by  minor  personalities,  sometimes  dis- 


ATTEMPT  TO  CREATE  LEAGUE  OF  NATIONS  (1919)  389 

cussed  major  questions,  but  in  no  case  asserted  the  right 
of  making  settlements  and  carrying  them  out. 

On  Monday,  November  15,  1920,  the  Assembly  of  the 
League  of  Nations,  with  241  delegates  from  41  nations, 
was  opened  at  Geneva,  and  its  sessions  continued  until 
December  18.  A  second  meeting  was  held  in  September, 
1921.  Much  useful  work  was  accomplished  at  these  two 
meetings,  but  neither  the  Council  nor  the  League,  during 
the  first  two  years  of  the  League's  existence,^  took  the 
initiative  in  the  settlement  of  any  dispute,  or  made  a  de- 
cision of  any  kind  contrary  to  the  wishes  or  orders  of  the 
British,  French,  and  Italian  governments.  The  Assembly 
entirely  failed  to  assert  its  authority  over  the  Council. 
The  latter  did  what  it  was  told  to  do,  or  decided  questions 
it  was  asked  to  decide,  by  the  British,  French,  and  Italian 
premiers.  The  numerous  questions  upon  which  the  states- 
men of  the  three  Entente  powers  are  still  of  different  minds 
have  not  come  before  the  League  of  Nations. 

^  The  formal  ratification  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  was  finally  completed 
on  January  10,  1920,  and  the  League  of  Nations  thus  began  to  function  on 
that  day. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

THE  EEFUSAL  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  TO  RATIFY  THE 
TREATIES  AND  ENTER  THE  LEAGUE  (1919-1921) 

THE  yearning  of  the  world  for  a  new  international  or- 
der, which  would  tend  to  make  wars  less  frequent  and 
diminish  the  burden  of  armaments,  did  not  decrease  in 
intensity  and  did  not  express  itself  less  emphatically  after 
the  signing  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  than  before.  But  in 
every  country  disappointment  over  the  work  of  the  confer- 
ence at  Paris  was  bitter,  and  because  the  covenant  of  the 
League  of  Nations  had  been  made  an  integral  part  of  the 
treaty  of  Versailles  the  League  was  discredited  along  with 
the  impracticable  treaty  provisions.  So  strong  was  the 
opposition  to  the  ratification  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  in 
the  United  States  that  the  four  other  treaties  were  never 
even  submitted  to  the  Senate. 

The  treaty  of  Versailles  was  subjected  to  long  and  pene- 
trating criticism  in  the  French  Senate  and  Chamber  of 
Deputies.  The  protests  showed:  (1)  fear  that  national 
interests  had  been  sacrificed  to  questionable  international 
advantages;  (2)  uncertainty  as  to  the  adequacy  of  the 
means  of  enforcing  the  provisions  of  the  treaty;  (3)  dis- 
satisfaction with  the  League  of  Nations  covenant;  (4) 
doubt  as  to  the  wisdom  of  attempting  to  incorporate  in  one 
document  the  solution  of  two  different  questions — making 
peace  with  Germany  and  setting  up  the  machinery  of  a 
new  world  order.  In  Italy  and  Japan  parhamentarians  de- 
clared that  the  treaty  was  conceived  in  the  interests  of 
France  in  so  far  as  Europe  was  concerned,  and  in  the  in- 
terests of  Great  Britain  outside  Europe.  France,  Italy, 
and  Japan  ratified  the  treaty,  however,  because  in  definite 

390 


UNITED  STATES  REFUSES  TO  RATIFY  TREATIES    391 

particulars  it  did  advance  French  and  Japanese  interests, 
while  Italy  was  to  be  the  principal  beneficiary  of  the  treaty 
with  Austria.  In  every  essential  matter  the  treaty  was 
advantageous  to  Great  Britain.  Since  the  various  arrange- 
ments made  at  the  end  of  the  Napoleonic  wars,  no  interna- 
tional settlement  had  advanced  so  strikingly  the  strategic, 
territorial,  political,  and  economic  interests  of  the  British 
Empire.^  Of  the  principal  powers  the  United  States  alone 
had  gained  nothing  tangible  by  the  war. 

The  treaty  fight  in  the  United  States  Senate  is  a  dramatic 
episode  in  American  history.  Its  merits  and  importance 
can  hardly  be  estimated  until  we  have  more  perspective. 
But,  in  justice  both  to  Mr.  Wilson  and  to  his  opponents,  as 
well  as  for  the  purpose  of  gaining  a  clear  idea  of  the  issues 
at  stake,  the  popular  and  prevalent  impression  of  Mr.  Wil- 
son as  a  fanatical  idealist  or  a  man  unwilling  to  confess 
his  failure,  and  of  the  Republican  senators  as  partizans 
inspired  with  the  sole  motive  of  discrediting  a  Democratic 
president,  must  be  corrected. 

During  the  latter  part  of  the  peace  conference  Mr.  Wil- 
son became  ill,  and  his  physical  condition  affected  his  judg- 
ment. This  condition  led  to  a  nervous  breakdown,  so  that 
during  the  critical  period  of  the  treaty  fight  it  was  doubted 
by  many  whether  he  was  capable  of  making  reasonable 
decisions.  The  senators,  on  the  other  hand,  from  the  very 
fact  of  the  president's  condition,  felt  that  the  treaty  and 
the  covenant  needed  the  most  careful  scrutiny,  and  when  it 
was  discovered  that  ratification  would  mean  involving  the 

*  Great  Britain 's  principal  naval  and  commercial  competitor  was  ruined 
and  bound  hand  and  foot,  and  the  major  parts  of  her  colonies  were  added 
to  the  British  Empire;  the  elaborate  competitive  system- — merchant  marine, 
cables,  banks,  and  business  interests — erected  by  German  enterprise  in  every 
part  of  the  world  fell  chiefly  into  British  hands;  the  British  protectorate 
over  Egypt  was  recognized ;  the  British  self-governing  dominions  were  given 
membership  in  the  League  of  Nations;  Great  Britain's  right  to  speak  for  India 
was  acknowledged;  and  no  question  (present  or  future)  of  self-determinntion 
that  might  embarrass  the  British  Empire  was  introduced  even  by  inference 
into  the  clauses  of  the  treaty.  This  new  status  was  guaranteed  by  article  X, 
which  had  been  cut  down  by  omitting  the  qualifying  clauses  suggested  by 
President  Wilson  in  his  original  draft  of  the  article. 


392  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

United  States  in  obligations  and  responsibilities  that  we 
were  asked  to  assume  without  compensatory  advantages, 
reservations  were  proposed.  There  is  no  reason  to  believe 
that  the  senators  who  voted  consistently  against  ratifica- 
tion without  reservations  were  not  inspired  by  enlightened 
devotion  to  duty.  A  proposal  was  before  them  to  abandon 
what  had  been  the  policy  of  the  United  States  in  foreign 
affairs  since  the  foundation  of  the  republic,  and  yet  no  ad- 
vantages either  to  the  world  or  to  America  were  convinc- 
ingly set  before  them  as  a  reason  for  so  drastic  a  step. 

Mr.  Wilson  had  ample  warning  of  the  opposition  that 
would  be  made  to  the  unqualified  acceptance  of  the  League 
of  Nations  as  drafted  at  Paris,  but  he  failed  to  take  the 
steps  that  might  have  induced  the  Senate  to  ratify  the 
treaty.  He  did  not  perceive  that  American  public  opinion 
would  not  follow  him  in  the  successive  compromises  that  he 
had  felt  compelled  to  make  during  the  Paris  negotiations. 
Faced  with  the  alternatives  of  inviting  the  participation 
of  the  Senate  in  the  peace  conference  or  of  taking  the 
American  people  into  his  confidence  each  time  he  made  a 
compromise,  he  chose  neither  course.  He  could  have  over- 
ridden the  Senate's  opposition  only  if  he  had  had  the  people 
behind  him.  Of  all  the  points  he  took  to  Paris,  the  last  to 
give  up,  in  view  of  the  attitude  of  the  Senate,  was  that  of 
''open  covenants,  openly  arrived  at."  Yet  for  weeks 
secrecy  shrouded  the  conditions  of  peace  dictated  to  the 
Germans,  and,  even  after  the  terms  were  made  known  in 
European  countries,  Mr.  Wilson  forbade  their  publication 
in  the  United  States.  During  these  weeks  the  President 
lost  the  confidence  of  the  American  people,  and  in  every 
successive  step  of  the  treaty  fight  public  opinion  rallied 
more  and  more  to  the  side  of  the  senators  who  refused  to 
accept  the  treaty  without  reservations.  After  his  nervous 
breakdown  the  president,  either  because  of  mental  inca- 
pacity or  because  of  the  mistaken  advice  of  those  around 
him,  persisted  in  believing  that  the  people  were  in  favor  of 


UNITED  STATES  REFUSES  TO  RATIFY  TREATIES    393 

ratifying  the  treaty  as  he  had  brought  it  back  from  Paris. 

Immediately  after  the  treaty  of  Versailles  was  signed 
President  "Wilson  left  Paris.  He  arrived  in  New  York  on 
July  8  and,  in  person,  on  July  10  presented  the  treaty  for 
ratification.  In  his  speech  recommending  that  the  Senate 
give  its  assent  to  the  treaty,  Mr.  Wilson  made  it  clear  that 
he  expected  his  decisions  during  the  course  of  the  negotia- 
tions to  be  approved  without  modification  in  any  particular. 
It  was  his  thesis  that  reservations  to  the  articles  creating 
the  League  of  Nations  would  vitiate  the  whole  treaty.  This 
attitude  he  never  modified.  When  the  Foreign  Relations 
Committee  reported  the  treaty  to  the  Senate  with  reserva- 
tions, three  groups  formed :  most  of  the  Democrats  favored 
ratification  without  reservations ;  most  of  the  Republicans 
favored  ratification  with  reservations ;  and  a  small  group, 
called  "bitter-enders,"  were  determined  to  reject  the  whole 
treaty.  The  debates  closed  on  November  15,  1919.  If  the 
minority  Democrats  had  given  in  to  the  majority  Republi- 
cans, it  would  have  been  possible  to  secure  more  than  the 
two  thirds  necessary  for  ratification.  An  effort  was  made 
to  compromise  on  the  reservations  in  order  to  secure  the 
acceptance  of  the  treaty.  This  last  chance  of  ratification 
was  blocked  by  the  president,  who  advised  his  followers  in 
the  Senate  to  vote  against  the  treaty  if  any  reservations 
were  appended  to  it.  On  November  19  the  treaty  definitely 
failed  to  pass  the  Senate,  the  Democratic  minority  and  the 
bitter-enders  combining  to  defeat  ratification. 

President  Wilson  could  have  changed  his  tactics  and  have 
resubmitted  the  treaty  with  the  intimation  that  he  was 
willing  to  accept  the  more  important  of  the  fifteen  reserva- 
tions, with  modifications  in  their  wording.  But  he  did  not 
choose  to  do  so.  On  the  contrary,  he  declared  that  the 
question  of  the  League  of  Nations  and  his  attitude  towards 
ratification  would  have  to  be  submitted  to  the  people  at  the 
presidential  election  a  year  later.  This  would  be,  in  his 
own  language,  ^ '  a  solemn  referendum. ' ' 


394        »AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

During  1920  the  tendency  of  the  Entente  premiers  to 
usurp  the  functions  of  the  League  Council,  or  to  ignore  it, 
and  the  continued  state  of  war  and  conflicting  ambitions  in 
Europe,  seemed  to  confirm  the  wisdom  of  Senator  Lodge 
and  his  colleagues  of  the  majority.  When  the  treaty  ques- 
tion was  finally  submitted  to  the  people  on  November  2, 
1920,  after  a  campaign  in  which  the  League  of  Nations 
played  a  leading  part,  Mr.  Wilson's  candidate,  ex-Gover- 
nor Cox  of  Ohio,  was  defeated  by  an  overwhelming  vote. 
Senator  Harding,  also  of  Ohio,  who  had  advocated  the 
reservations  in  the  Senate,  received  the  largest  majority 
ever  given  a  presidential  candidate. 

Many  considerations  of  internal  politics  entered  into  the 
presidential  election,  and  it  is  doubtful  whether  the  vote 
indicated  the  unwillingness  of  the  American  people  to  com- 
mit the  United  States  to  the  principle  of  an  international 
association.  In  fact,  leading  Republicans,  including  nota- 
bly ex-President  Taft,  although  they  supported  Mr.  Hard- 
ing, had  taken  throughout  the  treaty  fight  the  position  that 
the  fears  of  the  senators  who  made  the  reservations  to  the 
covenant  were  not  wholly  justified.  In  November,  1919, 
only  the  uncompromising  tactics  of  President  Wilson  pre- 
vented treaty  ratification  and  our  entry  into  the  League. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  public  opinion  would  have  approved 
at  that  time  ratification  with  very  mild  reservations. 

But  the  psychological  moment  for  cooperating  with  our 
associates  in  the  World  War  by  a  belated  acceptance  of  the 
Paris  treaties  had  passed.  The  aftermath  of  the  war  had 
revealed  a  reversion  on  the  part  of  European  governments 
to  the  diplomatic  methods  and  ambitions  for  which  we  had 
pilloried  Germany.  With  the  German  imperial  govern- 
ment no  longer  a  disturbing  factor  in  international  politics, 
the  relations  between  great  powers  and  small  states  and 
among  the  great  powers  themselves  seemed  to  show  no 
marked  improvement  over  1914.  It  began  to  be  realized 
that  if  the  treaty  of  Versailles  had  been  accepted  we  should 


UNITED  STATES  REFUSES  TO  RATIFY  TREATIES    395 

logically  have  had  to  ratify  the  other  treaties.  Taken  as  a 
whole,  the  Paris  settlements  were  beginning  to  cause  sharp 
differences  of  opinion  among  the  Entente  Powers  in  Europe 
and  the  Near  East,  and  our  own  State  Department  had 
become  involved  in  difficulties  with  Great  Britain  over  the 
interpretation  of  the  mandate  programs.^  Because  of  Ire- 
land, Egypt,  Persia,  and  India,  American  public  opinion 
was  turning  against  Great  Britain.  The  unreasoning  pres- 
sure that  France  put  upon  Germany,  French  encourage- 
ment to  Polish  imperialism,  the  betrayal  by  France  of  the 
Armenians  in  Cilicia,  the  failure  of  Japan  to  adjust  the 
Shantung  difficulty  with  China,  and  Japan's  insistence 
upon  refusing  the  United  States  freedom  of  cable  com- 
munications through  the  island  of  Yap  destroyed  American 
faith  in  the  desire  of  our  late  associates  to  cooperate  with 
us  in  establishing  a  new  world  order.  We  began  to  realize 
that  at  Paris  the  other  powers  had  feathered  their  nests 
well,  and  had  expected  that  the  United  States  would  be 
willing  to  share  in  responsibilities  without  demanding  to 
share  in  privileges. 

War  with  Germany  and  Austria  was  terminated  by  a 
joint  congressional  resolution  passed  by  the  House  of  Eep- 
resentatives  on  June  30,  by  the  Senate  on  July  1,  and  signed 
by  President  Harding  on  July  2,  1921.  On  August  25  the 
American  high  commissioner  in  Berlin  and  the  German 
foreign  minister  signed  a  treaty  declaring  at  an  end  the 
technical  state  of  war  that  had  continued  ever  since  the 
armistice.  The  treaty  of  Berlin  was  very  brief.  Germany 
assented  to  the  terms  of  the  American  resolution  of  July 
2,  and  agreed  to  give  to  the  United  States  all  the  rights  and 
advantages  stipulated  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  with  the 
exception  of  certain  portions  specifically  mentioned  as  ex- 
cluded at  the  volition  of  the  United  States.  The  repudiated 
portions  were :  the  covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations ;  the 

*  For  these  differences  of  opinion  among  the  Entente  powers  see  Chapter  XL, 
and  for  the  American  interpretation  of  the  mandate  programs  see  Chapter 
XLVI. 


396         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

boundaries  of  Germany;  the  political  clauses  for  Europe; 
the  sections  concerning  German  rights  outside  Germany, 
with  the  exception  of  the  cession  of  the  German  colonies 
**in  favor  of  the  Principal  Allied  and  Associated  Powers"; 
and  the  provisions  concerning  the  organization  of  labor. 
By  these  omissions  the  United  States  dissociated  herself 
from  the  other  signatories  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  in 
regard  to  the  responsibility  for  the  war,  the  trial  of  war 
criminals,  and  the  guaranties  for  the  fulfilment  of  the 
treaty.  The  right  was  reserved  to  participate  in  a  repara- 
tions commission  or  any  other  commission  established  un- 
der the  treaty.  But  ''the  United  States  is  not  bound  to 
participate  in  any  such  commission  unless  it  shall  elect  to 
do  so." 

From  the  point  of  view  of  our  associates,  the  making  of 
a  separate  treaty  of  this  character  was  preposterous  and 
denoted  the  return  of  the  United  States  to  the  old  rigid 
policy  of  refusal  to  participate  in  Old  World  affairs. 
Without  giving  us  advantages  such  as  they  had  gained 
by  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  the  Entente  Powers  had  hoped 
to  secure  our  aid  in  its  enforcement.  But  American 
idealism  could  not  answer  a  call  to  the  renunciation  of 
particular  interests  and  to  world  service  that  was  not 
answered  by  the  other  nations.  Our  treaty  with  Germany 
was  an  inglorious  termination  of  what  had  started  out  to 
be  a  crusade.  But  it  was  to  be  expected  that  we  should 
tire  of  a  monopoly  of  the  crusading  spirit.  Public  opinion, 
therefore,  received  the  news  of  the  separate  treaty  with 
Germany,  followed  by  similar  treaties  with  Austria  and 
Hungary,  without  protest;  and  these  agreements  were 
promptly  ratified. 

In  reality  the  United  States  did  only  what  the  other  vic- 
torious powers  had  done.  We  negotiated  and  concluded 
treaties  strictly  on  the  basis  of  our  own  interests,  and,  as 
we  had  no  interests  at  stake  in  the  pohtical  clauses  of  the 
treaty  of  Versailles,  with  the  single  exception  of  the  Ger- 


UNITED  STATES  REFUSES  TO  RATIFY  TREATIES    397 

man  colonies,^  our  government  refused  to  assume  any  obli- 
gation under  the  clauses  pertaining  to  political  settlements 
in  or  outside  Europe,  except  in  the  case  of  the  colonies. 
But  we  reserved  all  the  privileges  in  economic  matters  that 
a  victorious  nation  is  accustomed  to  exact  of  a  defeated 
enemy.  At  the  same  time,  being  dubious  about  the  value  of 
the  concessions  wrung  from  Germany  at  Versailles,  we 
were  careful  not  to  bind  ourselves  to  participate  even  in  the 
reparations  commission. 

After  three  and  one  fourth  years  of  maintaining  an  army 
of  occupation  on  the  Rhine,  the  American  government  noti- 
fied the  Allied  governments  that  the  cost  of  the  armies  of 
occupation  was  considered  by  us  a  first  lien  on  German 
reparations.  In  his  note  of  March  11,  1922,  Secretary 
Hughes  presented  a  bill  of  $240,000,000,  the  cost  of  the 
army  of  occupation  up  to  the  end  of  1921,  and  contended 
that  provision  should  be  made  for  the  payment  of  this  sum 
in  the  apportionment  of  the  sums  that  were  being  paid  by 
Germany.  The  Allied  governments  replied  that  the  United 
States  had  no  claim  on  any  sums  collected  by  the  repara- 
tions commission,  because  (a)  we  were  not  signatories  of 
the  treaty  of  Versailles ;  (b)  Germany  had  bound  herself  in 
such  a  way  by  that  treaty  that  she  had  no  authority  to  make 
a  separate  treaty  with  the  United  States,  which  involved 
financial  settlements;  and  (c)  that  the  United  States  had 
taken  no  part  in  collecting  from  Germany  the  sums  against 
which  she  was  attempting  to  place  a  lien. 

Our  flare-up  of  idealism  might  have  accomplished  much 
in  establishing  a  sane  and  magnanimous  world  peace.  The 
Paris  conference  had  proved,  however,  that  our  associates 
were  unwilling  to  follow  us  along  the  path  of  Mr.  Wilson's 
fourteen  points.    As  each  great  power  advanced  and  de- 

*  Article  119  reads:  "Germany  renounces  in  favor  of  the  Principal  Allied 
and  Associated  Powers  all  her  rights  and  titles  over  her  overseas  possessions. ' ' 
That  the  United  States  did  not  accept  the  treaty  of  Versailles  does  not  alter 
the  fact  that  the  United  States  has  become  one  of  the  title-holders  of  the 
former  German  colonies. 


398         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

fended  its  particular  interests,  American  enthusiasm 
cooled.  The  revelations  of  intrigues  and  conflicts  of  inter- 
ests in  the  Near  East ;  the  expenditures  of  enormous  sums 
for  military  purposes  by  our  former  associates,  great  and 
small,  who  could  not  pay  even  the  interest  on  their  indebt- 
edness to  us;  the  refusal  to  consider  our  interests  in  the 
distribution  of  the  German  cables ;  and  the  effort  to  exclude 
American  capital  and  trade  from  mandated  territories, 
gradually  turned  American  public  opinion  from  eagerness 
to  cooperate  with  Europe  to  indifference.  When  Secretary 
Hughes  declined  the  invitation  to  the  economic  conference 
at  Genoa,  scheduled  for  April,  1922,  the  policy  of  refusing 
to  sit  in  a  conference  that  seemed  to  us  more  political  than 
economic  was  generally  approved. 

That  the  United  States  has  not  abandoned  the  hope  of 
constructive  international  cooperation  in  the  settling  o£- 
world  problems,  however,  was  indicated  by  the  Limitation 
of  Armaments  Conference,  which  assembled  by  invitation 
of  the  American  government  at  Washington  on  November 
12,  1921,  with  nine  powers  participating.  Public  opinion 
supported  President  Harding  when  he  issued  the  call  to 
the  conference,  showed  great  interest  in  its  proceedings, 
and  indorsed  the  program  for  limitation  of  armaments  and 
for  emancipating  China  which  the  United  States  was  par- 
tially successful  in  having  adopted.  The  later  opposition 
in  the  Senate  indicated  the  constitutional  weakness  of  our 
government  for  carrying  on  international  negotiations 
rather  than  any  marked  hostility  to  the  treaties  on  the  part 
of  the  American  people. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

WOELD  POLITICS  AND  THE  TREATY  OF  VEESAILLES 
(1919-1922) 

THE  peace  conference  that  assembled  at  Paris  in  Janu- 
ary, 1919,  undertook  four  tasks :  to  reestablish  peace 
by  imposing  treaties  upon  Germany,  Austria,  Hungary, 
Bulgaria,  and  Turkey;  to  bring  together  all  the  nations  of 
the  world  into  an  organization  for  the  preservation  of  peace 
and  for  the  amelioration  of  political,  economic,  and  social 
conditions  through  international  cooperation ;  to  dispose  of 
the  territories  wrested  and  the  indemnities  exacted  from  the 
defeated  enemies;  and  to  harmonize  the  conflicting  ambi- 
tions and  policies  of  the  principal  victors  so  that  the  gen- 
eral world  supremacy,  which  their  union  had  given  them, 
might  remain  permanently  theirs. 

The  effort  to  attain  these  objects  made  necessary  the  ex- 
clusion of  the  minor  allies  from  a  voice  in  the  decisions,  the 
abandonment  from  the  principle  of  '^open  covenants,  openly 
arrived  at,"  and  the  partial,  if  not  complete,  repudiation 
01  the  pre-armistice  agreement  with  Germany.  The  minor 
allies  were  excluded  because  they  had  not  won  the  war  and 
would  not  be  called  upon  to  guarantee  the  peace;  open 
diplomacy  was  discarded  because  it  was  regarded  as  im- 
practicable and  would  certainly  have  defeated  the  objects 
which  the  Entente  statesmen  had  in  mind;  and  the  pre- 
armistice  agreement  was  ignored  because  the  framers  of 
the  treaty  of  Versailles  were  sure  that  Germany  would  have 
done  the  same  thing  had  she  been  in  their  place.^    Mr.  Wil- 

^  These  are  not  the  opinions  of  the  writer,  but  are  a  summing  up  of  the 
arguments  advanced  in  the  speeches  of  the  leaders  of  the  conference  when 
they  were  explaining  and  defending  their  attitude  on  these  questions. 

399 


400  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

son  and  other  members  of  the  American  delegation  con- 
tended for  a  just  and  practicable  peace,  but  they  were 
worsted  by  the  Entente  statesmen,  whose  concern  was  not 
a  durable  world  peace  but  the  advancement  of  their  world 
policies.^ 

The  treaty  of  Versailles  has  been  subjected  to  a  minute 
analysis  and  criticism  and  has  been  attacked  and  defended 
by  the  leading  men  of  our  day.  Several  of  those  who  signed 
it  have  denounced  it  bitterly,  along  the  lines  of  the  protest 
of  General  Smuts,  who  declared  at  the  time  he  signed: 

''The  promise  of  the  new  life,  the  victory  of  the  great 
human  ideals,  for  which  the  peoples  have  shed  their  blood 
and  their  treasure  without  stint,  the  fulfilment  of  their 
aspirations  towards  a  new  international  order  and  a  fairer, 
better  world,  are  not  written  in  this  treaty.  .  .  .  There  are 
territorial  settlements  which  in  my  humble  judgment  will 
need  revision.  There  are  guaranties  laid  down  which  we 
all  hope  will  soon  be  found  out  of  harmony  with  the  new 
peaceful  temper  and  unarmed  state  of  our  former  enemies. 
J  There  are  punishments  foreshadowed  over  most  of  which 
Jjt  ^'^l^a  calmer  mood  may  yet  prefer  to  pass  the  sponge  of  obliv- 


'Mf  J^      Uon.     There  are  indemnities  stipulated  which  can  not  be 

.t*_  (jvJ^^.^  jexacted  without  grave  injury  to  the  industrial  revival  of 
JEurope,  and  which  it  will  be  in  the  interests  of  all  to  render 
tnore  tolerable  and  moderate.  There  are  numerous  pin- 
pricks which  will  cease  to  pain  under  the  healing  influences 


^ 


K'VV'*^'' 


f  the  new  international  atmosphere. 


for  Europe  out  of  the  ruin  brought  about  by  this  war. 
The  enemy  peoples  should  at  the  earliest  possible  date  join 

^^^    g^        f^       *This  was  definitely  stated  by  M.  Clemeneeau  to  the  Chamber  of  Deputies 

\_pf*^'^     ^jA^   O'^   January  2,   1919,   and   by  Mr,   Wilson   in  several   interviews   and   speeches 

•"^   Cjt/V\|\  after  the  conference,  notably  with  members  of  the  Senate  committee  on  foreign 

vV  -V  J^^    affairs,  when  he  explained  that  he  had  been  forced  at  Paris  to  acknowledge 

\^       \  r^^      \  the   priority    of   the    secret   agreements   among   the    Entente    powers   over    his 

I?jj3  k         "fourteen  points."     Although  most  of  these  agreements  had  been  concluded 

V/^^^         %j^        during   the   war   and   after   Entente   statesmen   had   proclaimed   the   idealistic 

('     .M^^^^         objects  for  which   they   were   fighting,   they  were  brought  forward   as  sacred 

NjJoVA  obligations.     Had  not  the  principal  object  of  the  war  been  to  uphold  "the 

/\     .j^  \         sanctity  of  treaties"? 


THE  TREATY  OF  VERSAILLES  (1919-1922)  401 

the  League,  and  in  collaboration  with  the  Allied  peoples 
learn  to  practise  the  great  lesson  of  this  war,  that  not  in 
separate  ambitions  or  in  selfish  domination,  but  in  common 
service  for  the  great  human  causes,  lies  the  true  path  of 
national  progress." 

Like  President  "Wilson,  General  Smuts  had  placed  too 
much  hope  in  the  League  of  Nations,  and  had  been  willing 
to  compromise  with  the  aims  and  methods  of  the  old  diplo- 
macy in  order  to  get  the  covenant  of  the  League  written 
into  the  treaty.  The  threefold  demand  of  those  who  op- 
posed the  ''real  peace  of  the  peoples"  was:  punishments, 
reparations,  and  guaranties.  The  first  two  could  be  assured 
only  by  the  third.  Much  has  been  written  about  the  atmos- 
phere of  hatred  and  resentment  at  the  Paris  conference, 
and  about  the  fear  of  statesmen  to  defy  public  opinion. 
But  were  the  men  who  determined  the  policies  of  the  confer- 
ence really  swayed  by  bitterness  and  passion  or  by  the 
clamor  of  the  people  for  a  punitive  peace?  The  feeling 
against  Germany  that  undoubtedly  existed  in  Entente  coun- 
tries and  in  the  United  States  was  used  to  justify  treaty 
terms  unique  in  history,  and  also  to  explain  the  failure  of 
the  Wilsonian  principles.  But  the  student  of  world  politics 
finds  in  the  treaty  not  only  the  realization  of  hopes  cher- 
ished since  the  early  days  of  the  war  and  written  into  secret 
treaties,  but  also  the  triumph  of  theories  advocated  long 
before  the  World  War  by  writers  and  statesmen  who  be- 
lieved that  the  European  nations  were  engaged  in  a  struggle 
for  existence.  The  carefully  elaborated  pohcies  advanced 
during  the  Paris  conference  demonstrate  the  pr^evalence  of 
the  behef  that  the  attitude  of  nations  towards  one  another 
can  be  summed  up  in  the  primitive  formula,  ''Your  life  or 
mine. ' ' 

The  trial  of  the  kaiser  and  war  criminals,  the  acknowl- 
edgment of  Germany's  responsibility  for  the  war,  and  the 
admission  on  the  part  of  Germany  that  she  owed  an  in- 
demnity larger  than  her  capacity  to  pay  were  the  three 


h 


402         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

points  written  into  the  treaty  that  put  the  German  people 
at  the  mercy  of  their  victors. 

It  was  fully  realized  that  no  German  government  could 
bring  to  book  the  kaiser  and  high  officers  of  the  army  and 
navy  upon  charges  preferred  by  their  enemies,  that  it  was 
against  human  nature  for  an  entire  nation  to  avow  itself 
wholly  and  solely  in  the  wrong,  and  that  payment  of  the 
sums  named  in  the  treaty  would  mean  that  Germany,  upon 
the  basis  of  the  world  trade  figures  of  1913,  should  be  al- 
lowed to  enjoy  immediately  the  privilege  of  monopolizing 
more  than  half  of  the  whole  world's  trade.  Punishments 
and  reparations,  in  the  form  provided  for  by  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  were  impossibilities,  if  not  absurdities.  Hence, 
failing  to  punish  her  sovereign  and  national  heroes,  and 
defaulting  in  indemnity  payments,  Germany  would  have 
to  submit  to  the  permanent  stranglehold  of  the  guaranties. 
The  treaty  thus  gave  the  Entente  powers  the  right  to 
destroy  Germany  as  a  world  power  and  to  make  it  impos- 
sible for  her  ever  to  regain  political  and  commercial  pres- 
tige outside  Europe.  Unless  Ave  realize  the  deliberate  in- 
tention of  the  treaty,  couched  in  unmistakable  terms,  we 
can  not  understand  the  aftermath  of  the  Paris  conference 
in  Europe  and  the  consistent  attitude  of  France.  The 
framers  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  had  no  illusions  about 
the  trial  of  war  criminals  or  the  ability  of  Germany  to  pay 
the  sums  they  intended  to  demand.  But  by  making  it  im- 
possible for  Germany  not  to  default  they  would  hold  in 
their  hands  indefinitely  the  means  of  preventing  her  from 
aspiring  to  regain  her  political  and  commercial  influence 
throughout  the  world. 

If  it  endures,  the  treaty  of  Versailles  will  mark  the 
disappearance  of  Germany  as  a  world  power,  just  as  the 
treaty  of  St.  Germain  marks  the  disappearance  of  Austria- 
Hungary  as  a  world  power.  For  the  treaty  took  away  Ger- 
many's army,  navA^  and  merchant  marine;  restricted  her 
air  service;  expelled  her  subjects  from,  and  confiscated 


THE  TREATY  OF  VERSAILLES  (1919-1922)  403 

their  enterprises  and  individual  property  in,  the  Near  East 
and  Far  East  and  in  all  the  countries  of  the  victorious 
coalition ;  put  an  end  to  German  missionary  effort,  Catholic 
and  Protestant,  in  Africa  and  Asia ;  forbade  the  export  of 
German  capital ;  and  placed  Germany 's  foreign  trade  under 
the  control  of  a  commission  made  up  of  appointees  of  com- 
petitor nations  from  whose  decision  there  is  no  appeal. 
Germany  lost  her  cables,  her  foreign  banks  and  commercial 
houses ;  she  agreed  to  an  export  tax  on  her  products,  to  be 
fixed  by  her  competitors ;  she  consented  to  internationalize 
her  rivers  under  foreign  commissions,  and  to  allow  her 
neighbors  to  use  her  canals  and  railways  and  certain  of 
her  ports  independently  of  German  control.  Since  reci- 
procity was  not  promised  in  the  disarmament,  transporta- 
tion, and  economic  clauses  of  the  treaty,  Germany  virtually 
signed  away  her  sovereignty  and  put  herself  into  the  hands 
of  receivers. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  world  politics  the  treaty  of 
Versailles  marked  a  new  stage  in  the  struggle  of  European 
nations  for  world  power.  Precedents  were  set  that,  if 
successfully  maintained,  will  make  the  investments  of  for- 
eigners in  every  country  of  the  world  dependent  solely  upon 
the  strength  of  their  own  government  or  its  ability  to  form 
and  maintain  alliances  with  dominant  powers.  Up  to  the 
time  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  international  law  distin- 
guished between  the  property  of  a  government  and  that  of 
its  nationals.  Private  property  was  not  considered  liable 
to  seizure.  According  to  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  a  bel- 
ligerent country,  within  its  own  dominions  or  those  of  its 
allies,  has  the  right  to  confiscate  property  of  any  nature 
belonging  to  subjects  of  an  enemy  country,  and,  if  victorious 
at  the  end  of  the  war,  to  compel  the  government  of  the  de- 
feated country  to  agree  to  indemnify  its  own  nationals  for 
property  thus  confiscated. 

The  treaty  of  Versailles  divided  Germany's  overseas 
possessions  among  the  British,  French,  and  Japanese,  and 


404  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

canceled  the  concessions  and  leases  and  took  away  the  prop- 
erty of  Germans  in  the  former  territories  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  Egypt,  Siam,  China,  and  the  parts  of  the  world 
under  the  domination  of  the  victorious  colonial  powers. 
Germany  renounced  her  participation  in  international  com- 
missions, and  her  privileges  of  extraterritoriality  in  coun- 
tries where  the  European  powers  and  the  United  States 
enjoyed  a  special  regime  for  residents  and  traders.  But  the 
victorious  powers  did  not  give  up  their  own  enjoyment  of 
these  privileges. 

One  third  of  the  industrial  population  of  Europe  is  there- 
fore deprived  of  any  part,  on  equal  terms,  in  world  markets 
and  in  the  exploitation  of  the  rest  of  the  world.  The  treaty 
of  Versailles  has  taught  the  dispossessed  a  lesson  very  dif- 
ferent from  that  General  Smuts  hoped  they  would  learn 
"in  collaboration  with  the  Allied  peoples."  For  the  treaty 
is  the  triumph  of  '  *  separate  ambitions ' '  and  * '  selfish  domi- 
nation" and  denies  the  principle  of  ''common  service  for 
the  great  human  causes."  The  Germans  have  learned  that 
defeat  in  war  brings  personal  disaster  as  well  as  national 
humiliation,  and  that  if  a  man  wants  to  be  sure  of  his  abil- 
ity to  trade  on  equal  terms  with  other  nations  and  keep 
what  he  has  created  in  other  parts  of  the  world,  he  must  be 
the  subject  of  a  power  that  is  able  to  develop  opportunities 
for  its  nationals  and  protect  them  in  the  enjoyment  of  those 
opportunities  by  possessing  superior  force  and  knowing 
how  to  use  it. 

When  we  consider  the  origins  of  the  World  War  and  the 
manner  in  which  the  Germans  carried  on  their  side  of  the 
conflict,  we  may  think  the  punishment  none  too  severe.  Un- 
fortunately, the  lesson  is  driven  home  elsewhere  than  in 
Germany.  The  aftermath  of  the  war  has  shown  that  Brit- 
ish, French,  Italians,  Japanese,  and  Americans  are  un- 
willing to  trust  one  another.  They  believe  that  their  ''place 
in  the  sun"  will  be  made  secure  only  by  their  own  argu- 
ments and  by  a  vigilant  and  aggressive  foreign  policy.    The 


A  >•  B 


THE  TREATY  OP  VERSAILLES  (1919-1922)  405 

greater  their  political  and  economic  interests  in  various 
parts  of  the  world,  the  more  they  will  strive  to  defend  them 
by  their  own  efforts. 

A  reading  of  the  German  observations  on  the  terms  of 
the  treaty  of  Versailles  (May  29,  1919)  and  the  answer  of 
the  Allies  (June  16)  is  necessary  if  one  would  understand 
the  implications  of  the  various  principles  that  inspired  the 
peace  terms.  The  Germans  protested  against  the  one- 
sided application  of  what  the  Allies  had  considered  the  ful- 
filment of  ideals.  Disarmament,  self-determination  of 
peoples,  liberation  of  natives  in  colonies  from  exploitation, 
abolition  of  capitulations  in  Asiatic  countries,  cancelation 
of  leases  and  concessions,  non-fortification  and  free  pas- 
sage of  the  Kiel  Canal,  internationalization  of  waterways, 
leases  at  ports,  a  free  port  at  Danzig  for  a  landlocked  state, 
unrestricted  through  transit  on  canals  and  railways,  pun- 
ishment of  officers  and  soldiers  guilty  of  inhuman  conduct 
in  war,  trial  of  rulers  and  ministers  accused  of  having 
been  responsible  for  the  war,  a  league  of  nations,  an  inter- 
national labor  commission,  restoration  of  the  loot  from 
museums  to  invaded  states,  cancelation  of  loans  foisted  on 
weak  states  at  large  discounts  and  usurious  rates  of  inter- 
est, waiving  of  the  Chinese  Boxer  indemnity,  nullification 
of  treaties  and  restoration  of  indemnities  obtained  by 
force — none  of  these  provisions  is  open  to  objection.  They 
all  mark  a  distinct  step  forward  in  the  progress  of  civiliza- 
tion, and  in  their  ensemble  they  represent  the  evil  results 
and  at  the  same  time  the  motivating  causes  of  world 
politics. 

But  the  embarrassing  difficulty  that  their  inclusion  in 
the  treaty  of  Versailles  has  raised  for  the  victorious  powers 
is  the  finding  of  a  ground  that  will  at  the  same  time  justify 
their  imposition  upon  the  enemy  and  the  refusal  of  the 
victorious  powers  to  apply  them,  or  analogous  principles, 
to  themselves.  In  their  reply  to  the  Germans  the  Entente 
Powers  took  the  position  that  everything  demanded  of 


406         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Germany  was  just  and  reasonable  in  itself,  but  that  the 
reason  for  the  demands  was  the  fact  that  Germany  was 
responsible  for  the  war  and  had  to  be  punished.  Eighteen 
months  later  Premier  Lloyd  George  was  correct  in  stating 
that  the  basis  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  was  Germany's 
war  guilt.  In  the  final  analysis,  however,  the  acknowledg- 
ment of  her  guilt,  and  the  ability  to  impose  penalties  be- 
cause of  it,  lay  in  the  verdict  of  an  ordeal  by  battle.  Hence, 
the  basis  of  the  treaty  was  in  reality  the  victory  of  the 
Entente  powers. 

As  the  aftermath  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  falls  heavily 
upon  the  world  and  brings  complications  of  all  sorts  for 
the  victorious  powers  in  their  relations  with  European  and 
non-European  peoples,  we  see  that  the  stipulations  inserted 
in  the  treaty  to  right  wrongs,  make  restitutions,  and  remedy 
geographical  and  economic  inequalities  can  no  more  be 
limited  in  their  application  to  the  vanquished  powers  than 
was  the  principle  of  self-determination  during  the  war. 
From  disarmament  down  to  the  Boxer  indemnity,  most  of 
the  demands  made  upon  Germany  would  have  been  justified 
and  possible  of  fulfilment  had  the  victors  bound  themselves 
to  follow  the  same  principles  in  their  deahngs  with  other 
peoples.  With  reciprocity  in  all  matters  where  reciprocity 
would  have  been  for  the  common  good,  the  treaty  of  Ver- 
sailles would  have  been  a  peace  of  justice.  Without  reci- 
procity it  was  a  peace  of  force,  and  its  terms  were  possible 
of  execution  only  so  long  as  the  force  that  caused  the  Ger- 
mans to  sign  the  treaty  continued  to  be  applied  to  make 
them  execute  it. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

WORLD  POLITICS  AND  THE  TREATY  OF  ST.  GERMAIN 
(1919-1922) 

THE  answer  of  President  Wilson  to  Austria-Hungary's 
peace  overture  of  October  7, 1918,  was  one  of  the  most 
important  documents  issued  by  a  belligerent  government 
during  the  war.  It  was  the  death-warrant,  not  only  of  the 
Dual  Monarchy,  but  also  of  a  dynastic  union  of  peoples  and 
states  that  had  existed  throughout  the  modern  period  of 
European  history.  The  American  president  announced 
that  the  great  powers  were  not  going  to  use  their  traditional 
privilege  of  deciding  what  were  to  be  the  territorial  and 
political  readjustments  and  how  they  were  to  be  effected, 
but  that  in  dealing  with  the  Hapsburg  empire  they  intended 
to  apply  practically  the  principle  of  self-determination,  in 
defense  of  which  and  for  the  enforcement  of  which  the 
Entente  Allies  and  the  United  States  claimed  to  be  fighting. 
Four  years  after  the  dissolution  of  Austria-Hungary,  it  is 
interesting  to  go  back  to  the  assurance  Mr.  Wilson's 
despatch  contained  and  subject  it  to  the  control  of  a  start- 
ling succession  of  disturbing  events. 

For  the  first  time  in  history,  a  great  nation,  asked  to 
make  peace  with  Germany,  based  the  argument  of  non 
possumus  on  the  ground  that  the  wishes  of  the  peoples  to 
be  liberated,  and  not  its  own  interests,  the  interests  of  its 
associates,  or  those  of  the  enemy,  were  primarily  at  stake, 
and  that  the  peoples  concerned  in  the  readjustment  were 
to  decide  the  matter.  Was  the  contention  of  President 
Wilson  practicable,  or  was  the  settlement  of  the  Hapsburg 
succession  possible  only  by  dictating  the  treaty  terms  to  the 
successor  states  in  the  same  way  as  to  the  enemy?    The 

407 


408  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

disruption  of  the  Hapsburg  empire  was  a  momentous  de- 
cision, and  those  who  decreed  it  assumed  a  grave  respon- 
sibility. 

In  his  speech  of  September  27,  1918,  the  president  had 
already  proclaimed  the  universality  of  the  ideals  for  the 
triumph  of  which  the  United  States  threw  her  weight  into 
the  balance  against  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary,  In 
order  to  make  clear  the  exact  sentiment  of  his  country  he 
took  for  illustration  the  infamous  treaties  of  Brest-Litovsk 
and  Bukharest.  The  treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk  showed  Ger- 
many's disregard  of  the  rights  of  nations  she  purported  to 
be  liberating  from  the  Russian  yoke.  The  Poles  and  the 
Baltic  states  were  not  allowed  to  participate  in  framing 
the  treaty.  The  treaty  of  Bukharest  showed  a  conquering 
nation  imposing  her  will  by  force  upon  a  conquered  nation 
and  exacting  economic  privileges  that  meant  an  abdication 
of  sovereignty  for  the  vanquished.  We  held  up  to  abhor- 
rence foreign  policy  based  on  expediency  and  force.  We 
declared  that  right  and  justice  must  triumph  everywhere. 
We  encouraged  the  aspirations  to  independence  of  all  small 
nations. 

Austria-Hungary,  like  Russia,  but  unlike  France  and 
Italy  and  Germany,  was  a  political  organism,  not  a  nation. 
It  had  grown  through  centuries  by  conquering  and  annexing 
alien  peoples.  Austrians  and  Hungarians  had  suppressed 
the  freedom  and  national  life  of  these  peoples,  but  were  not 
able  to  assimilate  them.  Before  the  spread  of  education 
among  the  masses,  the  granting  of  general  suffrage,  and 
the  formation  of  the  habit  of  newspaper-reading,  the  Haps- 
burgs  ruled  comfortably.  The  great  body  of  the  people 
consisted  of  ignorant  peasants,  and  the  land-owning  aristo- 
cratic element  among  the  subject  races  supported  the  Haps- 
burgs  because  it  was  politic  to  do  so.  But  during  the  past 
half-century,  as  the  world  has  been  evolving  towards  democ- 
racy, suppressed  nationalities  awakened  to  their  inferior 
position  in  the  empire.    When  they  tried  to  assert  them- 


THE  TREATY  OF  ST.  GERMAIN  (1919-1922)         409 

selves  politically  the  Austro-Hungarian  oppression  became 
severe.  After  the  disastrous  war  with  Germany  the  Aus- 
trians  (east  Geraians)  lost  to  Prussia  the  dominant  posi- 
tion among  the  German  states  of  central  Europe.  They 
were  not  sufficiently  numerous  to  keep  the  Hungarians  in 
subjection.  Consequently  in  1867  Germans  of  Austria  and 
Magyars  of  Hungary  formed  a  compact  to  transform  the 
empire  into  a  dual  monarchy.  The  Magyars  won  their  in- 
dependence.^ After  that,  they,  in  turn,  practised  towards 
smaller  races  what  they  had  suffered  before  at  the  hands  of 
the  Germans. 

For  fifty  years  the  Dual  Monarchy  continued  to  exist 
without  any  spirit  of  solidarity  among  the  various  elements 
in  Austria  and  Hungary.  Long  before  the  recent  war  it 
was  predicted  that  the  hybrid  regime  would  not  outlive 
Emperor  Francis  Joseph,  who  had  presided  over  it  during 
all  that  period. 

ETungariaiis  and  Germans  were  at  loggerheads,  and  each 
of  the  two  dominant  elements  was  in  constant  conflict  with 
the  lesser  races.  But  the  organism  held  together,  not  only 
because  it  was  to  the  mutual  advantage  of  Austrians  and 
Hungarians,  but  also  because  the  land-owning  and  indus- 
trial classes  among  the  lesser  nationalities  realized  the 
social  and  economic  advantages  of  belonging  to  a  large 
state.  These  classes  furnished  their  full  quota  of  officers 
for  the  army  and  navy,  and  were  prominent  among  the 
functionaries  of  the  Dual  Monarchy.  Two  Czechs,  for 
example,  were  successive  premiers  during  the  war. 

In  legislative  assemblies  Austrians  and  Hungarians  were 
able  to  hold  the  balance  of  power  by  playing  one  subject 
against  another.    The  Hungarian  policy  was  consistently 

^  By  the  terms  of  the  Ausgleich  of  1867,  the  empire  of  Austria  and  the 
kingdom  of  Hungary  were  constitutionally  independent  of  each  other,  but 
agreed  to  form  a  permanent  political  union  on  the  basis  of  equality  under  a 
common  sovereign  and  with  foreign  affairs  and  the  army  and  navy  and  the 
finances  of  the  Dual  Monarchy  under  unified  supervision.  The  commercial 
union,  however,  could  be  terminated  by  either  party  at  the  end  of  any  ten- 
year   period. 


410         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

one  of  suppression.  This  was  possible,  for  even  in  parts  of 
the  monarchy  inhabited  by  allogeneous  races  a  majority  of 
the  land-owners  was  Magyar.  Austria  was  able  to  keep  a 
semblance  of  parliamentary  life  by  granting  autonomy  to 
the  Poles  in  Galicia  in  return  for  their  support  in  the 
Vienna  Reichrath.  The  combination  was  advantageous  to 
the  Poles.  They  formed  only  a  bare  majority  in  Galicia 
over  the  Ruthenians  (Ukrainians),  and  needed  the  German 
support  as  much  as  the  Germans  needed  their  support. 
Although  the  Czechs  were  the  next  largest  racial  element 
in  Austria  to  the  Germans,  the  Austrians  were  not  com- 
pelled to  follow  the  same  policy  towards  them,  because  Bo- 
hemia was  wedged  in  between  Austria,  Germany,  and 
Russian  Poland.  Russia  supported  the  national  aspira- 
tions of  Jugo-Slavs  in  Hungary  and  Ruthenians  in  Austria, 
but  she  did  not  dare  to  encourage  either  Poles  or  Czechs. 
To  strengthen  their  national  aspirations  would  have  had  a 
dangerous  influence  upon  the  situation  in  Russian  Poland. 
There  were  two  forms  of  separatist  movements  in  Aus- 
tria-Hungary— national  and  irredentist.  A  national  move- 
ment is  the  aspiration  to  independence,  within  its  former 
political  limits,  of  a  subject  people.  An  irredentist  move- 
ment is  the  aspiration  to  political  union  with  a  neighboring 
state  of  the  same  blood  and  language.  The  Hungarian  and 
Czecho-Slovak  movements  were  national;  the  Ukrainian, 
Rumanian,  and  Italian  movements  were  irredentist.  The 
Poles,  confined  to  the  province  of  Galicia,  were  not  nation- 
alists to  the  point  of  desiring  independence,  because  auton- 
omy under  the  Austrians  was  preferable  to  union  with  a 
much  greater  number  of  Russian  Poles.  For  the  same  rea- 
son irredentist  propaganda  did  not  move  them,  and  they 
feared  that  its  application,  in  case  of  the  disruption  of  the 
empire,  would  militate  against  them  in  eastern  Galicia, 
where  the  great  majority  was  Ukrainian.  It  is  important  to 
bear  in  mind  this  classification,  because  it  distinguishes 
between  problems  relating  to  the  Hapsburg  dominions  alone 


THE  TREATY  OF  ST.  GERMAIN  (1919-1922)         411 

and  problems  iiidissolubly  connected  with  those  of  neigh- 
boring states. 

Because  they  stood  out  clearly  from  other  movements, 
and  because  we  had  definite,  tangible  reasons  for  encourag- 
ing them,  the  Czecho-Slovak  and  the  Jugo-Slav  movements 
were  mentioned  specifically  in  our  answer  to  Austria-Hun- 
gary. The  Czecho-Slovaks  had  been  giving  us  aid  against 
our  enemies,  and  the  Jugo-Slavs  belonged  to  the  same  race 
as  the  Serbians.  But  when  the  division  of  the  Hapsburg 
dominions  became  a  task  intrusted  to  a  conference  in  which 
the  United  States  had  a  leading  part,  it  was  found  that  the 
application  of  the  principle  of  self-determination,  even  if 
limited  to  friends,  presented  puzzUng  complications.  It 
was  as  hard  to  deal  with  the  Czecho-Slovaks  and  the  Jugo- 
Slavs  as  with  the  other  emancipated  peoples. 

It  is  probably  for  this  reason  that  when  they  drafted  the 
treaty  dictated  to  Austria,  the  principal  allied  and  asso- 
ciated powers  were  unwilling  to  call  into  consultation  the 
representatives  of  the  peoples  whose  destinies  were  af- 
fected. They  feared  the  effect  upon  their  own  harmony 
and  upon  the  purposes  they  had  in  mind  of  claims  advanced 
and  arguments  adduced  by  the  premiers  and  national  lead- 
ers of  the  east-central  and  southeastern  European  nations. 
On  May  31,  1919,  the  day  before  the  presentation  of  the 
treaty  to  the  Austrians,  its  text  was  communicated  to  the 
peace  conference  delegates  at  a  plenary  session.  Ruma- 
nians, Poles,  Czecho-Slovaks,  and  Jugo-Slavs  alike  pro- 
tested bitterly,  but  without  avail.  The  Austrian  protests 
were  equally  fruitless.  The  Austrian  delegates  signed  the 
treaty  on  September  10,  and  the  Austrian  government  rati- 
fied it,  yielding  to  hunger  pressure,  on  October  18,  1919. 
The  delay  of  three  months  between  the  presentation  of  the 
terms  of  peace  and  the  signature  of  the  treaty  was  due  to 
the  insistence  of  Italy  upon  dictating  the  military  clauses, 
and  also  the  political  clauses  where  her  interests  were  af- 
fected, and  the  diplomatic  effort  to  reconcile  the  successor 


412         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

states  to  the  provisions  that  infringed  upon  their  sover- 
eignty and  tended  to  render  them  economically  dependent 
upon  the  Entente  powers. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  treaty-making  the  Allies  had 
considered  the  Hapsburg  empire  defunct,  and  had  recog- 
nized the  separation  from  the  empire  of  more  than  thirty 
million  of  its  fifty  million  inhabitants.  Since  there  was  no 
longer  a  political  organism  known  as  the  Dual  Monarchy, 
Austrians  and  Hungarians  were  considered  separate  peo- 
ples with  no  bond  uniting  them.  Their  only  common  des- 
tiny was  that  of  being  defeated  enemies  who  would  have 
to  pay  the  penalty  of  defeat.  In  deciding  upon  the  bound- 
aries the  three  factors  ethnography,  strategy,  and  econom- 
ics were  successively  applied  for  the  purpose  ^f  taking 
away  as  mi^ch  territory  as  possible  from  the  Austrians  and 
Hungarians)  History  has  never  given  us  a  sterner  example 
of  the  age-old  principle  of  vae  victis  than  the  treaties  of  St. 
Germain  and  Trianon. 

The  treaty  of  St.  Germain  compelled  the  Vienna  govern- 
'\  ment  to  renounce  outright  its  tAvo  largest  and  most  populous 
'-  provinces,  Galicia  and  Bohemia.  The  province  third  in 
size,  Tyrol  and  Vorarlberg,  was  reduced  to  a  narrow  strip 
north  of  the  Brenner  Pass.  Parts  of  Styria  and  Carniola 
were  arbitrarily  lopped  off,  and  all  of  the  provinces  border- 
ing on  the  Adriatic,  the  only  outlet  to  the  sea,  had  to  be 
abandoned.  Moravia  and  Silesia,  essential  to  Austria  not 
only  for  coal  but  also  for  food,  were  joined  with  Bohemia 
to  form  the  new  state  of  Czecho-Slovakia.  The  outlying 
province  of  Bukowina  was  given  to  Rumania.  Two  thirds 
of  the  Austrians  were  left  in  a  circumscribed  area  under 
the  Vienna  government,  condemned  to  bankruptcy  and 
slow  starvation,  and  although  they  comprised  only  one 
fourth  of  Austria's  pre-war  population,  they  were  saddled 
with  the  same  reparations  terms  as  Germany.  Vienna,  the 
third  city  of  Europe,  contained  thirty-five  per  cent,  of  the 
population  of  independent  Austria.    It  had  grown  naturally 


THE  TREATY  OF  ST.  GERMAIN  (1919-1922)         413 

as  the  capital  of  an  epipire  of  fifty  millions,  and  it  was 
manifest  that  under  the  new  conditions  it  could  survive  and 
the  Austrians  could  exist  only  by  a  free  exchange  of  com- 
modities with  the  succession  states  or  by  union  with  Ger- 
many. The  treaty  of  St.  Germain  did  not  provide  for  the 
former  and  it  forbade  the  latter. 

Like  the  Germans,  the  Austrian  delegates  were  not  al- 
lowed to  appear  before  their  judges  to  plead  their  case.    In 
a  written  memorandum  they  pointed  out  what  would  follow 
the  enforcement  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain.    From  what- 
ever standpoint  they  were  viewed  the  treaty  terms  seemed 
bound  to  create  more  causes  for  wars  than  they  removed. 
For,  like  those  of  Versailles,  they  were  based  upon  two  dan- , 
_gerous  illusions:  the  permanent  subserviency  and  isolation  '  '  ^^ 
of  the  Germanic  element  among  the  peoples  of  Europe,  and  U"  JT 
the  ability  of  the  non-Germanic  states  bordering  upon  post-     ''^''^^ 
bellum  Germany  and  Austria  to  develop  a  prosperous  in- 
dustrial and  commercial  life  independent  of  and  indifferent 
to  the  economic  and  social  rehabilitation  of  the  regions  I 
from  Hamburg  to  Vienna.  1 

The  first  illusion  is  shown  in  the  disposition  of  the  terri- 
tories taken  from  Austria  by  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain. 
When  strategic,  historical,  or  economic  arguments  were 
advanced  for  separating  German  population  from  Austria, 
there  was  never  any  hesitation.  The  principle  of  nation- 
ality did  not  apply  to  the  Austrians.  On  the  other  hand, 
economic,  strategic,  and  historical  considerations  had  no 
weight  when  invoked  by  the  Austrians.^  At  the  Paris  con- 
ference it  was :  ''Heads  I  win,  tails  you  lose."  One  can  not 
wade  through  the  mass  of  documents,  rejDorts,  and  speeches 
relating  to  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain  and  its  aftermath 
without  realizing  that  the  f  ramers  of  the  treaty  ignored  the 

^  Only  two  concessions  were  made  to  Austria.  A  plebiscite  was  provided 
for  in  the  district  of  Klagenfurt,  which  Italy  preferred  to  see  remain  with 
Austria  because  its  possession  by  the  Jugo-Slavs  would  embarrass  her;  and 
a  frontier  region  of  west  Hungary  was  awarded  to  Austria  for  the  obvious 
reason  of  maSing  bad  blood  between  the  two  enemy  peoples. 

^^  ■    I 


414         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

possibility  of  a  strong  Germany  in  the  future  moved  irre- 
sistibly to  war  by  irredentist  propaganda  or  in  a  position 
to  join  forces  advantageously  either  with  Slavs  against 
Latins  or  with  Latins  against  Slavs.  In  emancipating 
subject  peoples  the  Paris  conference  in  many  cases,  as  in 
the  Tyrol  and  Czecho-Slovakia,  simply  turned  the  tables. 
Three  millions  of  Germans,  living  in  regions  of  the  succes- 
sion states  neighboring  upon  German  and  Austrian  terri- 
tory, were  put  under  the  rule  of  their  former  subjects.  It 
was  taken  for  granted  that  the  German  element  in  Europe 
was  so  completely  crushed  by  the  war  that  this  condition 
would  not  give  rise  to  a  new  era  of  irredentist  propaganda, 
or  that  the  succession  states  would  remain  united  among 
themselves  and  in  the  political  orbit  of  a  united  entente. 

The  second  illusion  contradicted  the  great  lesson  of  mod- 
ern economic  history,  which  is  the  interdependence  of  na- 
tions. Even  if  the  motives  had  been  of  the  highest  and  had 
been  carried  out  in  a  spirit  of  altruism,  it  is  doubtful 
whether  the  economic  provisions  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Ger- 
main would  have  proved  less  harmful  to  the  tranquillity 
and  well-being  of  the  .peoples  the  treaty  emancipated  than 
were  its  political  provisions.  The  Hapsburg  empire  may 
have  been  the  result  of  snuffing  out  the  liberties  of  small 
nations.  But  there  can  be  no  doubt  of  the  material  ad- 
vantages, since  Europe  became  dependent  upon  world 
markets,  of  belonging  to  a  large  political  organism.  Under 
Franz  Josef  the  Hapsburg  dominions  enjoyed  common  rail 
and  water  communications  and  the  privilege  of  frea  inter- 
change of  commodities,  and  at  the  same  time  were  able  to 
build  up  a  merchant  marine  and  a  consular  system  that 
enabled  them  to  compete  with  the  other  great  powers  in 
world  markets. 

The  treaty  of  St.  Germain  separated  elements  from  Aus- 
tria and  united  them  to  their  "brothers  of  blood."  Poles 
and  Czecho-Slovaks  formed  free  states.  But  the  financial 
and  industrial  edifice  of  half  a  century  was  destroyed,  and 


THE  TREATY  OF  ST.  GERMAIN  (1919-1922)         415 

nothing  was  provided  to  take  its  place.     The  succession 
states,  deprived  of  free  access  to  the  Mediterranean  and 

of  a  merchant  marine,  and  compelled  to  establish  their       ^. 

own  diplomatic  and  consular  staffs  throughout  the  world,  ^^^^jj^^- 
suddenly  found  themselves  unable  to  count  upon  the  back-     .    j  ^ 
ing  of  a  great  power  in  their  international  relations.    And  ^  ^-^^^^"^^ 
their  normal  and  most  precious  markets  were  beyond  a  new 
frontier,  on  which  arose  a  menacing  tariff  wall.    Moreover, 
the  financial  and  economic  prostration  of  Vienna  and  the 
chaos  in  Germany  affected  them  so  vitally  that  there  was 
little  difference  between  victors  and  freedmen  on  the  one 
side  and  vanquished  on  the  other. 

Austria  had  no  colonies  and  had  not  taken  part  in  the 
extra-European  struggle  for  protectorates  and  spheres  of 
influence  either  before  or  after  becoming  a  dual  monarchy 
with  Hungary  as  an  equal  partner.  Italy  was  the  only 
great  power  that  profited  territorially  by  the  destruction 
of  the  Hapsburg  empire,  but  in  the  long  run  Germany 
seems  likely  to  receive  a  large  accession  of  territory.  Un- 
less the  successor  states  join  with  Austria  and  Hungary  in 
reforming  the  territories  of  the  old  empire  into  a  unitary 
economic  and  probably  political  system,  by  federating,  the 
treaty  of  St.  Germain  will  mark  the  completion  of  the  unifi-  , 
cation  of  Italy  and  Germany.  And  if  Italians  and  Slavs  ' 
strive  for  the  mastery  of  the  Balkans  the  balance  of  power 
may  once  more  be  held  by  a  Germany  greater  than  ever 
before,  because  she  will  have  lost  her  alien  provinces,  which 
were  as  much  a  source  of  weakness  as  of  strength,  but  wiU 
have  gained  sovereignty  over  all  the  Germans  of  Europe. 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

WORLD  POLITICS  AND  THE  TREATY  OF  TRIANON   (1919-1922) 

ALTHOUGH  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain,  signed  on  Sep- 
tember 10,  1919,  marked  the  official  end  of  the  Haps- 
burg  empire,  almost  another  year  elapsed  before  the  terms 
to  be  imposed  upon  Hungary  were  definitely  settled.  The 
treaty  of  Trianon,  with  Hungary,  was  conceived  in  the 
same  spirit  as  the  treaties  of  Versailles,  St.  Germain,  and 
Neuilly,  and  it  conformed  very  closely  in  its  text  to  the 
treaty  of  St.  Germain.  It  was  not  signed,  however,  until 
June  4,  1920,  because  of  the  internal  political  difficulties  of 
the  Hungarians,  which  retarded  the  establishment  of  a 
new  government;  their  conflicts  with  former  subject  peo- 
ples ;  and  the  unwillingness  of  the  successor  states  to  ratify 
the  treaty  of  St.  Germain  and  to  come  to  an  agreement 
among  themselves  as  to  a  division  of  the  spoils. 

The  treaties  of  Versailles  and  St.  Germain  gave  birth 
to  two  new  states,  Poland  and  Czecho-Slovakia.  Together 
with  Italy,  these  states  were  the  principal  beneficiaries  of 
the  treaty  of  St.  Germain.  Italy's  territorial  interests  were 
safeguarded  in  the  terms  of  the  armistice  of  November  3, 
1918,  and  in  settling  the  complicated  economic  and  financial 
problems  of  the  Hapsburg  inheritance  she  had  the  advan- 
tage of  a  voice  in  the  decisions.  For  giving  in  to  her  point 
of  view  in  matters  concerning  Austria,  France  and  Great 
Britain  were  rewarded,  in  turn,  by  her  willingness  to  take 
their  point  of  view  in  regard  to  the  European  and  world 
liquidation  of  Germany's  assets.  Hence  Italy  received  as 
large  a  share  of  the  inheritance  as  she  wanted,  fiscal  and 
tariff  freedom,  and  an  insignificant  financial  liability  as  a 

416 


THE  TREATY  OF  TRIANON  (1919-1922)  417 

successor  state  of  the  Dual  Monarchy.  Poland  and  Czecho- 
slovakia, on  the  other  hand,  were  not  in  a  position  to  defy 
the  principal  allied  and  associated  powers,  and,  having 
nothing  to  give  and  no  voice  in  the  treaty  decisions,  they 
had  to  take  what  was  given  them.  They  came  out  of  the 
conference  with  more  than  they  deserved  from  a  territorial 
point  of  view,  but  with  economic  and  financial  fetters  that 
bound  them  to  the  Entente  powers.  In  so  far  as  the  suc- 
cessor states  were  concerned,  both  the  territorial  and  econ- 
omic clauses  of  the  treaties  of  Versailles  and  St.  Germain, 
and  the  special  treaty  creating  Poland,  were  inspired  by  the 
political  and  commercial  interests  of  these  powers. 

The  Hungarian  inheritance  raised  questions  of  a  differ- 
ent order,  and  the  successor  states  were  not  in  the  same 
relation  to  the  Entente  powers  or  to  one  another.  Italy's 
claims  were  in  conflict  with  those  of  the  Jugo-Slavs.  The 
Jugo-Slavs  had  joined  Serbia,  an  allied  state  from  the  be- 
ginning of  the  war.  The  inheritor  of  eastern  Hungary  was 
Rumania,  another  allied  state,  whose  intervention  in  the 
war  had  been  solicited  by  the  Entente  and  to  whom  the 
Entente  powers  were  bound  by  a  secret  treaty  that  prom- 
ised explicit  rewards  for  intervention.  To  complicate  the 
drawing  of  new  boundaries,  Serbian  and  Rumanian  claims 
to  the  banat  of  Temesvar  overlapped. 

During  the  peace  conference  a  revolution  at  Budapest 
brought  into  power  a  Bolshevist  government  that  for  some 
months  defied  the  authority  of  the  victorious  powers.  After 
it  was  overthrown  the  Hungarians  came  to  blows  with  the 
Rumanians.  The  Rumanian  army,  disregarding  orders 
from  Paris,  captured  Budapest  and  proceeded  to  loot  Hun- 
gary. '  Declaring  that  it  was  simply  taking  the  reparations 
question  into  its  own  hands  and  getting  back  what  had  been 
stolen  from  Rumania,  the  Bukharest  government,  paying  no 
attention  to  Entente  protests,  took  from  Hungary  locomo- 
tives and  rolling  stock,  military  supplies,  and  cattle.  This 
may  have  been  the  quickest  method  of  securing  restitution, 


IqU,  Ick^cA  !^   ^^^    ^^^^^^^ 


418         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  "WORLD  POLITICS 

but  it  upset  the  plans  and  calculations  of  the  experts  at 
Paris,  who  were  arranging  the  economic  clauses  of  the 
treaty  with  Hungary. 

The  impossibility  of  dealing  with  the  successor  states  of 
Hungary  in  the  same  way  as  with  the  successor  states  of 
Austria  was  impressed  upon  the  Entente  statesmen  by  an- 
other salient  fact  in  the  situation.  Czecho-Slovakia  was 
recognized  as  a  belligerent  in  the  last  months  of  the  war, 
while  Poland  was  the  creation  of  the  enemy  coalition,  and 
was  recognized  by  the  victors  only  by  the  invitation  to  take 
part  in  the  peace  conference.^  The  provisional  govern- 
ments set  up  by  the  Poles  and  Czecho-Slovaks  after  the 
collapse  of  Germany,  and  the  de  facto  extension  of  their 
authority,  needed  Entente  support.  The  Polish  and  Czecho- 
slovak frontiers  with  Germany  depended  not  on  their  own 
strength  but  on  the  good-will  of  the  peace  conference.  In 
regard  to  Hungary,  however,  the  principal  allied  and  asso- 
ciated powers  found  themselves  confronted  with  a  series 
of  fails  accomplis.  By  force  of  arms  the  Czecho-Slovaks 
took  Pressburg  (Pozony)  from  the  Hungarians,  winning 
for  themselves  a  port  on  the  Danube  and  control  of  railway 
communications  between  Vienna  and  Budapest.  By  force 
of  arms  the  Rumanians  occupied  Transylvania  and  a  part 
of  the  banat  of  Temesvar.  Similarly  the  Serbians  were  in 
control  of  the  rest  of  the  banat  and  Croatia,  Bosnia,  and 
Herzegovina,  and  were  contesting  Dalmatia  with  the  Ital- 
ians. The  disposal  of  the  greater  part  of  Hungary  and  of 
the  Adriatic  provinces  of  Austria  was,  therefore,  not  in  the 
hands  of  the  principal  allied  and  associated  powers.  They 
could  not  say  to  Rumania  and  Serbia  what  they  said  to 
Poland  and  Czecho-Slovakia:  ''You  are  our  creation  and 
your  existence  depends  upon  our  good-will.'^ 

The  treaty  of  St.  Germain  contained  an  article  against 
which  the  successor  states  (with  the  exception  of  Italy,  who 
was  not  to  be  bound  by  it)  protested  with  vehemence  at 

*  On  January  18,  1919,  six  days  after  the  conference  opened. 


THE  TREATY  OF  TRIANON  (1919-1922)  419 

the  eighth  plenary  session  of  the  conference  on  May  31, 
1919.  It  appears  in  identical  terms  in  articles  LI,  LVII, 
and  LX.  As  far  as  the  small  states  were  concerned,  it 
was  the  ''joker"  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain.    It  read: 

rhj^  <-' 
"The  Serb -Croat -Slovene  (Czecho- Slovak -Rumanian)  (f^iyx^ 
state  accepts  and  agrees  to  embody  in  a  treaty  with  the 
principal  allied  and  associated  powers  such  provisions  as 
may  be  deemed  necessary  by  these  powers  to  protect  the 
interests  of  inhabitants  of  that  state  who  differ  from  the 
majority  of  the  population  in  race,  language,  or  religion. 

"The  Serb -Croat -Slovene  (Czecho -Slovak -Roumanian) 
state  further  accepts  and  agrees  to  embody  in  a  treaty  with 
the  principal  allied  and  associated  powers  such  provisions 
as  these  powers  may  deem  necessary  to  protect  freedom  of 
transit  and  equitable  treatment  for  the  commerce  of  other 
nations." 

In  the  treaty  of  Trianon  this  clause  v/as  dropped  for 
Czecho-Slovakia  and  was  modified  for  Jugo-Slavia  and 
Rumania  in  articles  XLIV  and  XL VII  to  read: 

"The  Serb-Croat-Slovene  (Rumanian)  state  recognizes 
and  confirms  in  relation  to  Hungary  its  obligation  to  accept 
the  embodiment  in  a  treaty  with  the  principal  allied  and 
associated  powers  of  such  provisions  as  may  be  deemed 
necessary  by  these  powers  to  protect  the  interests  of  inhabi- 
tants of  that  state  who  differ  from  the  majority  of  the  pop- 
ulation in  race,  language,  or  religion,  as  well  as  to  protect 
freedom  of  transit  and  equitable  treatment  for  the  com- 
merce of  other  nations." 

Article  CCCI  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain,  repeated  in 
article  CCLXXXV  of  the  treaty  of  Trianon  and  CCIX  of 
the  treaty  of  Neuilly,  reestablished  the  pre-war  Danube 
commission  of  the  treaty  of  Berlin.  But  of  the  riparian 
states  only  Rumania  was  to  be  represented,  with  one  vote. 
The  other  three  commissioners  were  to  be  British,  French, 
and  Italian.    The  transportation  clauses  of  the  treaties  im- 


420  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

posed  upon  the  successor  states  disabilities  similar  to  those 
imposed  upon  enemy  states. 

The  heart  of  the  treaties  lies  in  the  clauses  quoted  above, 
and  their  modification  in  the  treaty  of  Trianon  denotes  a 
partial  victory  of  the  small  states  against  the  effort  of  the 
Entente  powers  to  control  the  internal  political  and  eco- 
nomic life  of  the  successor  states  of  Austria-Hungary. 

The  famous  minorities  article  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Ger- 
main, with  the  economic  clause  added  to  it,  shows  how  far 
the  Entente  powers  were  ready  to  go  to  infringe  upon  the 
sovereign  rights  of  the  states  created  or  greatly  increased 
in  area  by  the  victory  over  the  central  powers.  President 
Wilson,  who  was  ignorant  of  the  real  meaning  of  the  minor- 
ities articles,  tried  to  explain  and  justify  the  limitations  of 
sovereignty  imposed  on  the  successor  states  by  the  fact 
that  if  guaranties  were  not  given  new  wars  might  arise, 
the  burden  of  and  responsibilities  for  which  would  fall 
upon  the  principal  allied  and  associated  powers. 

The  representatives  of  the  successor  states,  however, 
argued  from  similar  clauses  in  the  treaty  of  Berlin  that  the 
intention  was  not  to  protect  minorities  but  to  give  the  great 
powers  an  excuse  for  intervening  in  the  internal  aifairs  of 
small  states  and  to  wrest  from  them  economic  concessions 
under  threat  of  calling  attention  to  non-fulfilment  of  such 
promises.  Specific  instances  of  this  form  of  political  pres- 
sure that  amounted  to  blackmail  could  be  cited.  If  it  were 
necessary  to  make  international  treaties  in  regard  to  the 
protection  of  minorities  in  independent  constitutional 
states,  why  was  Italy,  also  a  successor  state  and  heir  to 
large  minorities,  not  asked  to  subscribe  to  these  clauses? 
And  were  the  principal  allied  and  associated  powers  willing 
to  give  international  pledges  for  the  protection  of  minori- 
ties in  their  own  dominions?  The  small  states  wanted  to 
know  why  they  were  to  be  responsible  to  ''the  Principal 
Allied  and  Associated  Powers"  and  not  to  the  League  of 
Nations,  and  what  relation  the  second  paragraph  of  the 


THE  TREATY  OF  TRIANON  (1919-1922)  421 

minorities  article,  which  concerned  commerce,  had  to  the 
first  paragraph. 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain  the 
successor  states  (except  Italy)  were  not  asked  to  come  to 
an  understanding  with  the  principal  allied  and  associated 
powers  about  ''provisions  to  protect  freedom  of  transit 
and  equitable  treatment  for  the  commerce  of  other  nations" 
on  the  basis  of  reciprocity,  but  were  ordered  to  agree  with- 
out reservation — just  as  enemy  states  had  been  ordered  to 
do — to  "such  provisions  as  these  powers  may  deem  neces- 
sary." In  the  treaty  of  Trianon  the  principal  allied  and 
associated  powers  remain  the  arbiters  for  the  protection 
of  minorities,  but  their  control  of  internal  transportation 
and  commerce  is  eliminated.  They  remain,  however,  mas- 
ters of  the  great  waterway  of  south-central  and  south- 
eastern Europe,  able  to  use  it  in  their  own  interests  for 
the  furtherance  of  their  own  shipping  and  commerce,  with- 
out any  reference  to  the  peoples  (except  the  Rumanians) 
to  whom  it  is  a  vital  means  of  communication  with  the  out-  Aj^^^^-^ 

side   world.      Germany,   Austria,    Czecho-Slovakia,   Jugo-  '    ''  "^  ' 
Slavia,  and  Bulgaria  are  not  represented  on  the  Danube 
commission.  \J. 

It  is  impossible  to  go  into  a  detailed  examination  of  the 
treaty  of  Trianon.    But  it,  like  the  treaty  of  St.  Germain,    ..   -^  t  'jr 
exhibits  the  principles  inspiring  the  world  policies  of  domi-  i/i-4^A  ^^**^ 
nant  powers.     These  powers  believe  that  their  strength 
gives  them  the  right  to  assert  the  transcendency  of  their 
political  and  economic  interests  in  every  part  of  the  world,  j^      ,  ,.   . . 
There  are  two  weights  and  two  measures,  one  for  them-  •  .ic^**^* 

selves  and  those  who  are  strong  enough  to  defy  them,  and 
the  other  for  weaker  peoples.  And  they  are  willing  to 
grant  privileges  to  weaker  states  and  to  protect  them  only 
if  in  exchange  their  own  paramount  authority  and  their 
special  interests  are  recognized. 


rfr. 


.\-^.>.^' 


I;wr^^,„_^j>y^j-^^ 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

WOELD  POLITICS  AND  THE  TEEATY  OF  NEUILLY  (1919-1922) 

BULGARIAN  plenipotentiaries  were  summoned  to 
Paris  at  the  end  of  July,  1919,  and  shut  up  in  the 
Chateau  de  Madrid  for  seven  weeks  before  they  received 
the  draft  of  the  treaty.  As  in  the  case  of  the  other  enemy 
delegations,  no  opportunity  was  afforded  them  to  present 
their  point  of  view  or  to  discuss  the  terms  of  the  treaty 
before  it  was  framed.  When  the  draft  of  the  treaty  was 
received,  written  remonstrances  and  suggestions  were  al- 
lowed and  were  answered  in  detail.  But  the  Bulgarians 
were  told  what  the  Germans,  Austrians,  and  Hungarians 
had  been  told,  i.  e.,  that  they  had  been  responsible  for  the 
war  and  had  conducted  it  in  a  barbarous  manner,  and  that 
the  various  penalties  imposed  upon  them  were  justified  not 
only  because  of  their  past  conduct  but  because  they  could 
not  be  trusted  in  the  future.  An  ultimatum,  requiring  sig- 
nature within  ten  days  as  an  alternative  to  the  denuncia- 
tion of  the  armistice,  made  the  Bulgarians  realize  that 
there  was  to  be  no  difference  between  the  treatment  ac- 
corded them  and  that  accorded  the  central  empires.  The 
treaty  between  the  Allied  powers  and  Bulgaria  was  signed 
at  Neuilly-sur-Seine  on  November  27,  1919. 

In  conjunction  with  the  other  treaties,  the  treaty  of 
Neuilly  makes  a  radical  shift  in  the  balance  of  power  in 
southeastern  Europe  and  the  Balkans.  Even  after  the 
treaty  of  Bukharest,  Bulgaria  remained  larger  and  more 
populous  than  Serbia  and  Greece.  From  the  Paris  peace 
conference  she  emerged  diminished  in  territory  and  popu- 
lation,  while   her   neighbors   became    countries    so   much 

.422 


THE  TREATY  OF  NEUILLY  (1919-1922) 


423 


larger  than  herself  that  it  is  diflficult  to  justify  the  strategic 
frontiers  of  the  treaty  of  Neuilly,  which  were  drawn  in 
disregard  of  the  principle  of  nationalities  and  of  the  eco- 
nomic necessities  of  the  Balkan  peoples.  The  figures  speak 
for  themselves : 


1914 

1921 

SQUARE 
MILES 

POPULATION 

SQUARE 
MILES 

POPULATION 

Bulgaria  

47,750 
53,454 

33,900 
42,000 

5,500,000 
7,700,000 

4,600,000 
4,800,000 

45,000 
113,221 

101,250 
60,000 

5,200,000 

Rumania  

Serbia   (or  Jugo- 
slavia)     

Greece^    

16,101,000 

13,635,000 
7,500,000 

If  the  Entente  statesmen  had  observed  the  eleventh  of 
the  fourteen  points  of  President  Wilson,  they  could  have 
taken  a  great  step  towards  permanent  peace  in  the  Balkans. 
It  was  possible  to  have  drawn  the  Macedonian  frontier  of 
Bulgaria  in  accordance  with  ethnic  considerations,  to  have 
insisted  upon  Rumanian  agreement  to  the  return  of  the 
southern  Dobrudja,^  and  to  have  left  Bulgaria  an  unham- 
pered outlet  in  western  Thrace  to  the  ^gean  Sea.  Ru- 
mania had  more  than  doubled  in  population  and  in  area, 
and  Serbia  had  tripled.  Greece,  enlarged  for  the  second 
time  within  a  decade,  still  had  glorious  opportunities  for 
further  expansion.  In  view  of  these  changes  in  the  rela- 
tive size  of  the  Balkan  states,  there  was  no  justification  for 
taking  territory  and  inhabitants  from  Bulgaria  and  for 
thus  still  further  increasing  the  number  of  Bulgarians  be- 
yond the  frontiers  of  their  country.  We  have  already  seen 
how  Bulgarian  irredentism  precipitated  the  second  Balkan 

^  The  figures  for  Greece  are  approximate,  and  will  be  larger  if  all  Thrace 
is  awarded  to  Greece  and  if  she  is  successful  in  retaining  the  Smyrna  region 
of  Asia  Minor.  I  am  indebted  to  "A  History  of  the  Peace  Conference  of 
Paris,"  iv,  p.  454,  for  the  table  given  above. 

'  This  strip  between  the  Danube  and  the  Black  Sea  was  ceded  to  Rumania 
by  Bulgaria  in  the  treaty  of  Bukharest  and  is  inhabited  almost  exclusively 
hj  Bulgarians. 


424  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

"War  and  influenced  Bulgaria  to  enter  a  coalition  with  the 
central  empires  and  Turkey  in  the  effort  to  attain  her 
national  unity. ^ 

The  avowed  intention  of  the  territorial  and  military  pro- 
visions of  the  treaty  of  Neuilly  was  to  render  Bulgaria 
powerless  to  make  another  attempt  to  upset  treaties  drawn 
to  her  disadvantage.  This,  in  justification  of  despoiling 
Bulgaria,  runs  through  the  claims  of  the  other  Balkan 
states  and  it  is  the  answer  of  the  Allied  powers  to  the 
Bulgarian  observations  on  the  treaty.  But  the  geographi- 
cal position  of  Bulgaria,  with  three  hundred  miles  of  Dan- 
ube river-front  lying  across  the  path  of  the  natural  rail 
route  to  Constantinople,  is  too  strong  a  factor  in  the 
struggle  for  mastery  in  the  Near  East  to  keep  Bulgaria 
down.  The  treaty  of  Neuilly  presupposes  a  state  of  mind 
in  the  Balkans  and  in  Europe  that  does  not  exist  and  that 
can  not  exist  so  long  as  European  diplomacy  believes  that 
the  race  is  to  the  swift  and  the  battle  to  the  strong.  As 
Premier  Venizelos  of  Greece  clearly  saw  in  1913  and  again 
in  1915,  and  as  King  Carol  of  Rumania  and  his  premier, 
M.  Marghiloman,  also  believed  in  1913,  too  great  a  shift  in 
the  balance  of  power  in  the  Balkans  would  bring  about  new 
combinations  leading  again  inevitably  to  war.  A  durable 
peace  for  the  Balkans  and  for  Europe  is  possible  only 
if  irredentism  can  be  diminished  as  a  source  of  friction, 
and  if  none  of  the  great  powers  is  longer  able  to  use  a 
vengeful  and  dissatisfied  Balkan  state  to  advance  its  own 
political  interests. 

Serbia  got  into  difficulties  with  Austria  in  1914  because 
of  public  sentiment  demanding  the  liberation  of  large 
bodies  of  Serbian-speaking  peoples  under  foreign  domina- 
tion in  adjacent  territory,  and  because  she  had  no  outlet  to 
the  Mediterranean  either  through  the  Adriatic  Sea  or 
through  the  ^gean  Sea.  The  absence  of  an  outlet  gave 
Austria-Hungary  the  opportunity  to  keep  the  lesser  king- 

*See  pp.  261-264,  297-298. 


THE  TREATY  OF  NEUILLY  (1919-1922)  425 

dom  in  economic  dependence,  and  deepened  the  bitterness 
aroused  by  the  irredentist  propaganda  of  the  Narodny 
Obrana.^  Russia  took  advantage  of  the  state  of  mind  of 
Serbia  to  work  against  Austria-Hungary  and  to  aspire  to 
the  hegemony  of  the  Balkans.  In  "the  war  to  end  war"  the 
goal  should  have  been  to  do  away  with  the  conditions  that 
brought  on  the  war.  But  the  treaty  of  Neuilly  put  Bul- 
garia in  the  position  in  which  Serbia  was  placed  before  the 
war.  Deprived  of  her  outlet  to  the  Mediterranean  and 
thwarted  in  her  ambition  to  complete  her  unification,  Bul- 
garia remains  a  valuable  pawn  to  be  used  by  Rumania 
against  Serbia,  by  Italy  against  Serbia,  by  Serbia  or  Ru- 
mania against  Greece,  and  by  Russia  against  Great  Britain 
or  France,  in  coalition  with  Turkey  or  independently. 

The  treaty  of  Neuilly,  like  the  other  treaties,  illustrates 
the  triumph  of  considerations  of  world  politics  over  con- 
structive statesmanship.  In  Entente  circles  there  was  a 
strong  current  of  expert  opinion  favorable  to  Bulgaria's 
double  plea  that  she  be  allowed  to  retain  her  port  on  the 
JEgean  Sea  and  her  border  districts.  Neither  friendship 
for  Bulgaria  nor  a  willingness  to  condone  her  participa- 
tion in  the  war  on  the  side  of  the  central  empires  and  Tur- 
key inspired  this  advocacy  of  equitable  treatment.  The 
so-called  Bulgarophiles  had  in  mind  the  liquidation,  in  so 
far  as  was  possible,  of  the  intolerable  and  dangerous  con- 
dition that  had  made  the  Balkans  the  cockpit  of  Europe 
and  the  quarter  in  which  causes  of  war  had  arisen  almost 
perennially  ever  since  the  beginning  of  the  decay  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire. 

But  the  British  did  not  care  to  offend  the  Greeks,  through 
whose  expansion  they  saw  the  opportunity  of  controlling 
Constantinople.  The  French,  on  the  other  hand,  supported 
the  claims  of  Serbia  and  Rumania  as  an  offset  to  Clemen- 
ceau's  attitude  on  the  minorities  question,  because  they 
desired  to  unite  Poland  and  the  other  successor  states  of 

»See  pp.  273-276. 


426         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  Hapsburg  empire  in  a  military  alliance  against  Bol- 
shevist Russia  and  against  Germany.^  The  Italians 
wished  to  keep  alive  the  bitterness  between  Serbians  and 
Greeks  and  Bulgarians  in  order  that  they  might  have  a 
fertile  field  in  which  to  work  against  pan-Serbianism  and 
pan-Hellenism. 

Owing  to  her  geographical  position  again,  Bulgaria  has 
not  felt  so  acutely  as  Germany  and  Austria  the  continued 
military  pressure  of  the  Entente  powers;  and  as  she  is  a 
self-sufficing  agricultural  country  with  few  industries,  an 
economic  boycott  would  not  weigh  heavily  upon  her.  On 
the  other  hand,  France  and  Italy  have  begun  to  realize 
that  the  friendship  of  Bulgaria  is  a  diplomatic  asset  in 
their  dealings  with  the  Little  Entente  (Rumania,  Jugo- 
slavia, and  Czecho-Slovakia)  and  in  their  relations  with 
Greece. 

In  the  treaties  of  St.  Germain  and  Trianon  the  cessions 
of  territory,  with  the  exception  of  those  to  Italy,  were  in 
each  instance  made  subject  to  agreements  between  the  prin- 
cipal allied  and  associated  powers  and  the  successor  state 
as  to  the  fulfilment  of  certain  promises:  protection  of 
minorities;  economic  and  transit  facilities;  handing  back 
of  property  belonging  to  Austrian  and  Hungarian  na- 
tionals; and  liability  for  portions  of  the  old  Austro-Hun- 
garian  national  debt.  Jugo-Slavia  and  Greece  are  not 
bound,  in  the  treaty  of  Neuilly,  to  respect  the  property  of 
Bulgarian  nationals  in  ceded  territories.    The  treaty,  more- 

^  Major-General  F.  J.  Kernan,  U.  S.  A.,  wrote  to  President  Wilson  on 
April  11  a  secret  report  of  his  mission  in  Poland  in  which  he  said:  "In 
central  Europe  the  French  uniform  is  everywhere  in  evidence,  officers  and 
men.  There  is  a  concerted,  distinct  effort  being  made  by  these  agents  to 
foster  the  military  spirit  in  Poland,  Czecho-Slovakia,  and,  I  believe,  in 
Rumania.  The  imperialistic  idea  has  seized  upon  the  French  mind  like  a 
kind  of  madness,  and  the  obvious  effort  is  to  create  a  chain  of  states,  highly 
militarized,  organized  as  far  as  possible  under  French  guidance,  and  intended 
to  be  future  allies  of  France.  .  .  .  The  claim  is  that  this  chain  of  strong 
military  states  is  essential  to  hold  back  the  tide  of  Russian  Bolshevism.  I 
regard  this  as  largely  camouflage.  Each  of  the  three  states  named  has 
aggressive  designs  on  the  surrounding  territory,  and  each  is  determined  to 
get,  by  force  if  need  be,  as  large  an  area  as  possible." 


THE  TREATY  OF  NEUILLY  (1919-1922)  427 

over,  contains  a  special  article  (XL VIII)  in  which  Bulgaria 
renounced  in  favor  of  the  principal  allied  and  associated 
powers  her  portion  of  Thrace,  which  was  won  in  the  first 
Balkan  War  and  not  taken  from  her  by  the  treaty  of  Bu- 
kharest.  In  return,  the  powers  undertook  ''to  insure  the 
economic  outlets  of  Bulgaria  to  the  ^gean  Sea."  This 
region  was  already  occupied  by  the  Greek  armies,  who 
extended  their  occupation  to  Adrianople  and  the  rest  of  the 
province,  which  had  remained  Turkish.  The  status  of 
Thrace  has  not  been  determined  and  no  definite  arrangre- 
ment  has  been  made  with  Greece  concerning  Bulgaria's 
''economic  outlet."  The  settlement  of  these  questions 
hinges  upon  the  disposition  of  Constantinople. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

WOELD  POLITICS  AND  THE  TEEATY  OF  SEVEES   (1920-1922) 

THE  Paris  conference  adjourned  at  the  end  of  Novem- 
ber, 1919,  without  having  come  to  an  agreement  upon 
three  vital  questions :  the  terms  of  the  treaty  with  Turkey ; 
the  adoption  of  a  common  policy  towards  Russia;  and  an 
understanding  as  to  the  means  to  be  employed  to  compel 
Germany  to  fulfil  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles. 
The  treaty  of  Versailles,  however,  had  created  internaT 
tional  machinery  for  its  enforcement.  Furthermore,  the 
covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations,  incorporated  in  the 
treaty,  provided  specifically  for  the  settlement  of  the  Turk- 
ish question,  and  generally  for  the  liquidation  of  such  a 
situation  as  that  which  existed  between  soviet  Russia  and 
the  Entente  powers.  In  January,  1920,  when  the  final  rati- 
fications of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  were  exchanged,  the 
Supreme  Council  of  the  Entente  powers  could  have  been 
merged  into  the  Council  of  the  League ;  and  had  this  been 
done,  the  new  organ  for  international  cooperation  would 
have  been  vested  immediately  with  dignity  and  authority. 
If  the  creators  of  the  League  had  believed  in  it  and  had 
been  willing  to  trust  their  interests  to  it,  the  skeptics  would 
have  been  convinced  and  the  cynics  confounded.  Such  a 
decision  would  have  had  an  incalculable  influence  upon 
American  public  opinion  nine  months  before  the  American 
electorate  was  asked  to  choose  between  entering  the  League 
and  staying  out  of  it.  The  League  was  the  potential  deus  ex 
machina.  The  neutrals,  associated  with  the  victors  in  a 
judicial  and  wise  application  of  the  treaties,  would  have 
aided  in  deciding  upon  a  world  policy  towards  Russia,  and 

428 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES  (1920-1922)  429 

in  settling  the  future  of  the  Ottoman  dominions  in  con- 
formity with  article  XXII  of  the  Versailles  treaty.  The 
moment  was  propitious  for  an  honest  effort  to  substitute 
international  cooperation  for  national  rivalry. 

But  the  premiers  of  Great  Britain  and  France  and  Italy 
elected  to  hold  secret  continuation  conferences,  in  which 
they  endeavored  to  settle  international  problems,  not  in 
the  interests  of  world  peace,  but  in  their  own  interests. 
Each  had  national  aspirations  to  satisfy  and  a  definite  for- 
eign policy  to  follow.^  They  saw  in  the  League  only  an 
instrument  to  advance  the  selfish  interests  of  the  countries 
they  represented.  It  would  never  do  to  let  representatives 
of  smaller  states,  as  provided  for  by  the  treaty  of  Ver- 
sailles, sit  in  on  their  discussions  and  have  the  power  to 
check  or  veto  their  bargains  and  compromises. 

The  inheritance  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  was  a  bone  of 
contention  and  a  cause  for  war  throughout  the  nineteenth 
century.  It  played  an  important  part  in  bringing  on  the 
World  War,  and  was  one  of  the  chief  considerations  in 
secret  diplomatic  negotiations  during  the  war.  Owing  to 
the  defection  of  Russia,  the  calculations  of  the  Entente 
powers  had  been  upset.  Because  Russia  had  denounced 
the  secret  treaties,  French,  British,  and  Italian  statesmen 
were  slow  to  solve  the  Ottoman  problem.  Had  czarist  Rus- 
sia survived  the  war,  she  would  have  installed  herself  in 
Constantinople,  and  there  would  have  been  no  question  of 
an  independent  Armenia.  On  the  other  hand,  the  continued 
military  cooperation  of  Russia  would  have  made  possible 
the  unchallenged  occupation  of  Asia  Minor  and  Syria  by 
Italy  and  France,  and  of  Mesopotamia  by  Great  Britain. 

*  In  writing  of  international  relations  one  most  often  uses  the  names  of 
nations  where  the  government  rather  than  the  people  is  meant.  Similarly, 
when  we  speak  of  premiers  and  cabinets,  in  matters  of  foreign  policy,  we 
do  not  distinguish  between  the  personal  active  agent  and  the  impersonal 
mnchinery  in  which  he  is  simply  a  cog.  If  they  want  to  keep  their  positions, 
European  premiers  must  conform  to  the  policies  dictated  to  them  by  their 
ministries  of  foreign  affairs.  Their  control  over  the  conduct  of  foreign 
affairs  is  in  the  methods  of  attaining  ends,  and  not  in  the  ends. 


^ 


430         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Palestine  would  have  been  internationalized.  But,  with 
Russia  eliminated,  Great  Britain  and  France,  Italy  and 
Greece  became  rivals  in  the  Ottoman  Empire  the  moment 
the  armistice  was  signed,  A  bitter  conflict  of  interests 
arose.  This,  and  this  alone,  prevented  the  conference  of 
Paris  and  the  continuation  conference  at  London  from 
settling  the  terms  of  the  Turkish  treaty.  This,  and  this 
alone,  Avas  responsible  for  the  renewal  of  Armenian  mas- 
sacres, and  for  the  rise  of  a  powerful  nationalist  faction  in 
Turkey,  able  to  defy  at  once  the  simulacrum  of  government 
at  Constantinople  and  the  victorious  powers.^ 

The  Turkish  question  called  for  three  main  decisions: 
what  territories  to  take  away,  how  to  force  the  Turks  to 
give  them  up,  and  what  to  do  with  them.  The  premiers 
were  no  more  ready  to  make  these  decisions  in  April,  1920, 
than  they  were  the  year  before.  Nevertheless,  there  always 
must  be  an  end  to  a  transitory  period.  The  delay  was 
affecting  the  prestige  of  the  Entente  powers  and  their  har- 
monious relations.  The  time  had  come  to  cut  all  Gordian 
knots  simultaneously.  On  May  11  the  decisions  of  the 
Entente  premiers,  incorporated  in  a  draft  treaty,  were 
communicated  to  the  Turkish  delegation  in  Paris.  After 
a  delay  of  three  months  the  treaty  was  signed  at  Sevres  on 
August  10,  1920.    Between  May  and  August  a  compromise 

^  The  American  partizans  of  the  League,  who  declared  that  our  refusal  to 
enter  the  League  and  to  take  a  mandate  for  Armenia  was  responsible  for  the 
delay  and  confusion  in  deciding  upon  terms  of  peace  with  Turkey,  showed 
a  lack  of  knowledge  of  the  fundamental  factors  in  the  Near  Eastern  difli- 
culties.  The  unwillingness  of  the  United  States  to  accept  an  Armenian 
mandate  was  the  result  rather  than  the  cause  of  the  tangle,  and  the  bitter 
clash  of  interests  dismayed  Americans  who  were  closely  watching  political 
developments  in  the  Near  East  and  who  desired  to  see  the  United  States 
assimie  responsibilities  there.  The  Armenian  mandate  was  never  offered  us 
on  practicable  terms.  When  the  San  Remo  conference  asked  President 
Wilson  to  decide  the  frontiers  of  Armenia  and  offered  the  mandate  to  the 
United  States,  Cilicia,  the  outlet  to  the  Mediterranean,  was  not  included, 
and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  offer  was  inspired  by  the  hope  of  seeing 
the  United  States  become  involved  in  the  profitless  and  costly  task  of  occupy- 
ing the  mountainous  northeastern  corner  of  Asia  Minor  and  interposing  a 
barrier  between  Russian  Bolshevism  and  the  proposed  British,  French,  and 
Italian  spheres  of  influence.  See  my  article  on  the  San  Remo  conference  in 
the  Century  Magazine,  July,  1920. 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVEES  (1920-1922)  431 

had  been  arranged  with  Greece  in  regard  to  the  Dodecan- 
nese,  and  the  Greeks  had  occupied  Thrace  and  had  been 
Buccessful  in  a  campaign  against  the  Turkish  nationalists 
in  northwestern  Asia  Minor.  The  authority  of  the  old 
Ottoman  government,  therefore,  extended  hardly  farther 
than  the  city  of  Constantinople,  which  was  occupied  by 
Entente  forces.  Asia  Minor,  under  the  leadership  of  Mus- 
tafa Kemal  Pasha,  was  in  open  rebellion  against  the  sul- 
tan. The  delegates  who  signed  the  treaty  of  Sevres,  which 
has  never  been  recognized  by  the  Anatolian  Turks,  repre- 
sented only  Constantinople  and  its  vicinity. 

The  treaty  of  Sevres  stipulated  that  Turkey  should  cede 
to  Greece  the  islands  of  Tenedos  and  Imbros,  Thrace  almost 
up  to  the  fortifications  of  Constantinople,  and  should  agree 
to  the  autonomy  of  Smyrna  with  a  generous  hinterland. 
This  latter  area  was  to  have  an  independent  parliament, 
but  was  to  be  under  Greek  administration,  and  was  to  have 
the  right  to  attach  itself  definitely  to  Greece  by  a  plebi- 
scite after  the  lapse  of  five  years.  Greece  received  also  the 
islands  of  the  Dodecannese,  except  Rhodes,  where  a  ple- 
biscite would  be  held  by  Italy  to  decide  the  destiny  of  the 
island  if  Great  Britain  agreed  to  cede  Cyprus  to  Greece.^ 
Turkey  recognized  the  independence  of  Syria,  Armenia, 
the  Hedjaz,  and  Mesopotamia;  accepted  the  French  pro- 
tectorate over  Tunisia  and  Morocco,  and  the  British  pro- 
tectorate over  Egypt  and  the  Sudan;  conceded  British 
sovereignty  over  Cyprus;  and  ceded  to  Great  Britain  the 
rights  secured  to  the  Ottoman  government  by  the  Suez 
Canal  treaty  of  1888.  Palestine  was  to  be  a  Jewish  na- 
tional home  under  the  League   of   Nations,  with  Great 

*  Italy,  however,  was  free  to  hold  this  plebiscite  at  any  time  within  fifteen 
years  after  the  cession  of  Cyprus  to  Greece.  Premier  Venizelos  sacrificed 
Rhodes,  in  Kis  compromise  with  Italy,  in  order  to  secure  the  abandonment  of 
Italian  opposition  to  the  Greek  occupation  of  Smyrna.  The  population  of 
Rhodes  is  overwhelmingly  and  fanatically  Greek,  and  the  treaty  of  Sevres 
therefore  created  a  new  Cretan  question  in  the  ^gean  Sea.  The  original  draft 
of  the  treaty  provided  that  Turkey  cede  the  Dodecannese  to  Italy,  but  this  was 
modified  in  favor  of  Greece  before  the  treaty  was  signed. 


432         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Britain  as  the  mandatory  power.  The  coasts  of  the  Darda- 
nelles, the  Sea  of  Marmora,  and  the  Bosphorus  were  to  be 
regarded  as  the  ''zone  of  the  Straits,"  under  the  control  of 
a  commission  appointed  by  the  League  of  Nations,  but  con- 
sisting of  British,  French,  Italian,  Japanese,  Rumanian, 
and  Greek  members.  In  the  final  draft  of  the  treaty  a 
Turkish  member  was  added  to  the  Straits  Commission. 

Before  the  treaty  of  Sevres  was  signed  it  had  already 
been  discredited  by  its  principal  authors.  The  premiers  in 
the  three-cornered  struggle  at  San  Remo,  each  antagonist 
pitted  against  the  other  two  for  the  triumph  of  national 
interests,  had  been  influenced  in  their  decisions  by  the  ques- 
tions of  recognizing  the  new  Russian  government  and  ex- 
acting reparations  from  Germany,  and  by  their  manifest 
inability  to  resort  to  arms  to  suppress  Mustafa  Kemal 
Pasha,  who  had  set  up  an  opposition  Turkish  government 
at  Angora.  This  accounts  for  their  generosity  to  Greece 
and  their  ability  to  arrive  at  what  they  believed  to  be  an 
equitable  compromise  of  their  own  conflicting  interests  in 
the  Near  East.  Great  Britain  wanted  to  trade  with  soviet 
Russia  and  call  off  the  propaganda  of  Lenin  in  Islamic 
countries.  Italy  wanted  food-stuffs  from  Russia.  France, 
on  the  other  hand,  was  primarily  interested  in  securing 
British  and  Italian  support  in  demanding  the  fulfilment  by 
Germany  of  the  disarmament  and  reparations  clauses  of 
the  treaty  of  Versailles.  In  their  anxiety  to  finish  with 
the  Turkish  question  and  preserve  harmony  in  dealing  with 
the  Germans  and  Russians,  the  three  premiers  agreed  not 
to  expel  the  Turks  from  Constantinople,  and  to  intrust 
Greece  with  the  task  of  pacifying  Thrace  and  the  Smyrna 
region.  Armenia  was  left  in  the  lap  of  the  gods.  France 
and  Great  Britain  were  already  in  military  possession  of 
the  Arabic-speaking  portions  of  the  empire. 

Forgetting,  or  ignoring,  the  considerations  of  European 
policy  that  led  to  the  compromise  of  San  Remo,  and  deem- 
ing insufficient  the  share  of  the  booty  assured  by  the  secret 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES  (1920-1922)  433 

agreement  entered  into  on  the  day  the  draft  treaty  was 
handed  to  the  Turks,  French  and  Italian  pubUc  opinion 
made  short  shrift  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres.  Premier  Mille- 
rand  was  accused  of  sacrificing  realities  to  Great  Britain  in 
the  Near  East  in  exchange  for  a  dubious  promise  of  sup- 
port against  Germany.  Signor  Nitti  anticipated  his  critics 
by  declaring  that  the  treaty  of  Sevres  was  all  wrong  and 
had  no  value,  because  it  was  signed  by  representatives  of  a 
government  that  was  not  in  control  of  the  territories  ceded, 
and  because  the  Entente  powers  were  unable,  or  unwilling, 
to  apply  force  against  the  nationalist  Turks,  who  refused 
to  be  bound  by  the  treaty.  Signor  Nitti  added  that  Italy 
could  not  be  counted  upon  to  help  the  Greeks  to  occupy  and 
maintain  themselves  in  the  territories  awarded  them  by  the 
treaty.  Both  French  and  Italian  public  opinion  believed 
that  the  British  stood  behind  the  Greeks,  and  that  any  ter- 
ritories governed  by  Greece  in  Asia  Minor  would  be  vir- 
tually under  British  protection.  The  French  and  the 
Italians  also  accused  Great  Britain  of  wanting  to  control 
Constantinople  by  the  indirect  method  of  having  it  fall  to 
the  Greeks. 

"With  the  exception  of  the  islands,  the  regions  given  to 
Greece  by  the  treaty  of  Sevres  were  not  in  the  possession 
of  the  powers  that  dictated  the  treaty.  A  fortnight  before 
the  treaty  was  signed,  the  Greeks,  acting  as  mandatories 
for  their  allies,  had  invaded  eastern  Thrace  and  had  occu- 
pied militarily  what  Turkey  was  asked  to  cede  to  them. 
More  than  a  year  earlier,  on  May  6,  1919,  when  Venizeios 
was  representing  Greece  at  the  Paris  conference,  Wilson, 
Lloyd  George,  and  Clemenceau  had  requested  him  to  seize 
Smyrna,  appointing  Greece  the  agent  of  the  victorious 
powers.  The  Turks  would  not  have  had  to  sign  the  treaty 
of  Sevres  had  not  the  Greek  armies,  advancing  from 
Smyrna  at  the  end  of  July,  1920,  defeated  the  nationalist 
Turks,  occupied  Brusa,  and  interrupted  the  communica- 
tions between  Constantinople  and  Angora.    In  respect  to 


434         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Thrace  and  the  Smyrna  region  the  treaty  of  Sevres  did  no 
more  than  recognize  a  fait  accompli,  which  had  been 
brought  about  by  the  sole  effort  of  the  Greek  armies. 

In  November,  1920,  following  the  death  of  King  Alex- 
ander, who  had  been  put  on  the  throne  of  Greece  by  the 
Entente  powers  in  1917,  Venizelos  was  defeated  in  a  gen- 
eral election  on  an  issue  he  himself  had  placed  before  the 
people — their  choice  between  him  and  former  King  Con- 
stantine.  Venizelos  had  to  leave  Greece,  and  Constantine 
returned  to  his  throne.  This  event  was  hailed  with  great 
satisfaction  in  Rome,  for  the  Italians  had  been  greatly 
embarrassed  by  the  diplomatic  influence  of  Greece  in 
Entente  councils  through  the  personality  of  Venizelos  and 
the  obligation  of  the  Entente  to  reward  Greece  because  of 
the  services  of  Venizelos.  In  France  the  return  of  King 
Constantine  was  considered  an  insult  to  the  dignity  and 
authority  of  the  Entente  and  a  sign  of  reviving  German 
influence.  The  French  government  seized  upon  it  as  a 
pretext  for  revising  the  treaty  of  Sevres.^  What  Greece 
had  received,  said  the  French,  was  given  to  her  because 
Venizelos  was  the  friend  of  the  Entente  and  could  be  relied 
upon  to  advance  Entente  interests.  This  thesis,  elaborated 
in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  and  in  the  press,  revealed  the 
motives  behind  the  treaties,  and  was  in  variance  with  the 
reply  of  the  Entente  powers  to  President  Wilson  during 
the  war  as  to  the  objects  they  had  in  mind.^  Was  the  pur- 
pose of  the  treaty  of  Sevres  to  free  the  Greeks  only  if  the 
country  to  which  they  were  joined  managed  its  affairs  in 
such  a  way  as  tp  safeguard  and  foster  the  political  interests 

*  Reasons  for  divergent  policies  in  relation  to  Greece  and  Turkey  are  given 
on  p.  455. 

'On  December  18,  1916,  President  Wilson  had  asked  the  two  groups  of 
belligerents  to  define  their  war  aims.  On  January  10,  1917,  the  Allied  gov- 
ernments sent  a  joint  reply,  dated  from  Paris,  which  gave  as  one  of  the 
specific  objects  of  the  war  freeing  the  alien  populations  under  Turkish  rule 
and  ending  forever  the  rule  of  the  Turks  in  Europe.  Nothing  was  ever 
said  during  the  war  about  emancipation  from  the  Turks  being  contingent 
upon  political  services  rendered  after  the  war  by  Greece  to  advance  the  par- 
ticular interests  of  the  Entente  powers  in  the  Near  East. 


r) 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES  (1920-1922)  435 

of  the  Entente  powers?  Moreover,  the  French  argument 
assumed  that  Greece  held  Thrace  and  Smyrna  as  a  gift 
from  the  Entente  powers,  and  also  set  the  dangerous  prece- 
dent that  a  treaty  was  subject  to  revision  if  subsequent 
interests  of  any  of  its  signatories  would  be  advanced  by 
its  revision. 

It  was  the  mihtary  impotence  of  the  Entente  powers  in 
the  Near  East  that  gave  the  Greeks  the  opportunity  to 
occupy  eastern  Thrace  and  to  install  themselves  as  agents 
of  the  Entente  at  Smyrna.  The  return  of  Constantine  was 
an  indication  that  the  Greeks  discounted  the  displeasure  of 
the  Entente  powers  and  knew  that  they  could  not  look  to 
western  Europe  for  aid  in  their  war  against  the  Angora- 
government.  Entente  prestige  suffered  greatly  in  the  Bal- 
kans and  in  Turkey  as  a  result  of  the  successfully  defiant 
attitude  of  Greece.  It  was  soon  realized  that  Great  Britain, 
Italy,  and  France  had  disagreed  about  the  advisability  of 
continuing  to  support  the  Greeks  and  were  going  to  take  no  ^^^^^'^-^-^ 
steps  to  enforce  the  provisions  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres.^ 
Mustafa  Kemal  Pasha  managed  to  keep  the  Greeks  at  bay 
during  1921,  and  gradually  won  the  support  of  all  the 
Turks.  Even  Constantinople,  under  the  guns  of  the  Allied 
war-ships,  became  Kemalist.  The  Turkish  nationalists  re- 
newed the  massacres  and  deportation  of  Greeks  and  Ar- 
menians with  the  same  impunity  as  during  the  World  War ; 
they  entered  into  diplomatic  relations  with  the  soviet  gov- 
ernment of  Russia;  they  refused  to  ratify  an  agreement 
with  the  Italians  until  its  terms  suited  them;  and  they 
attacked  the  French  in  Cilicia. 

Realizing  that  they  could  not  hold  Cilicia  against  the 
Turks  and  that  they  were  threatened  with  the  loss  of  Syria, 
the  French  government  sent  a  delegation  to  Angora  in 
March,  offering  to  withdraw  the  French  armies  from  Cilicia 
in  exchange  for  immunity  in  Syria.  For  several  months 
negotiations  were  carried  on,  and  finally,  on  October  30, 

»See  pp.  455-456,  484. 


436  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

1921,  the  French  government  announced  that  it  had  ratified 
an  agreement  made  at  Angora  with  tlie  Turkish  nationalist 
government,  declaring  peace  between  the  two  governments 
and  providing  for  economic  cooperation.  The  new  treaty 
gave  back  to  Turkey  not  only  Cilicia,  but  also  a  consider- 
able slice  of  northern  Syria.  The  new  frontier,  running 
from  the  Gulf  of  Alexandretta  to  the  Tigris  River,  recog- 
nized as  Turkish  territory  important  regions,  including  the 
districts  of  Aintab  and  Urfa.  A  special  regime  was  pro- 
vided for  the  port  of  Alexandretta.  Concessions  for  ninety- 
nine  years  were  given  to  a  French  group  for  iron-,  chrome-, 
and  silver-mines  in  the  valley  of  Harchite,  and  the  Turkish 
government  expressed  its  readiness  "to  examine  with  the 
greatest  good-will  other  requests  which  may  be  made  by 
French  groups  relative  to  concessions  in  mines,  railways, 
ports,  and  rivers,  on  condition  that  such  requests  conform 
to  the  interests  of  both  France  and  Turkey."  A  portion 
of  the  Bagdad  Railway,  wdth  a  branch  line  from  Adana  to 
Mersina,  was  leased  *'to  the  French  group  designated  by 
the  French  government. ' ' 

The  treaty  of  Angora  illustrates  how  considerations  of 
world  politics  prevail  over  signed  treaties,  loyalty  to  allies, 
^X^'  and  obligations  to  weaker  peoples.  In  order  to  keep  Syria 
'  and  to  get  a  fresh  hold  upon  the  economic  development  of 
Asia  Minor,  the  French  government  did  not  hesitate  to 
repudiate  its  signature  to  the  treaty  of  Sevres,  the  clear 
implications  of  article  XXII  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  and 
Entente  obligations  towards  the  Armenians  and  the  Arabs. 
France  went  into  Cilicia  ostensibly  to  protect  the  Arme- 
nians. When  she  found  that  she  could  not  stay  there,  she 
withdrew  without  assuring  the  lives  and  property  of  those 
on  whose  friendship  she  had  relied  to  make  possible  her 
initial  occupation  of  the  province.  Handing  the  districts  of 
northern  Syria  back  to  the  Turks,  without  consulting  the 
other  signatories  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres  and  the  members 
of  the  League  of  Nations,  constituted  a  violation  of  the 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES   (1920-1922)  437 

treaty  of  Sevres  and  of  the  League  covenant.  In  addition, 
the  French  government  knew  that  these  regions  of  northern 
Syria  had  been  recognized  as  Arab  in  the  Anglo-Hedjaz 
agreement  of  1915,  and  that  their  permanent  alienation 
from  Turkey  was  one  of  the  bases  upon  which  rested  the 
Sykes-Picot  agreement  made  between  Great  Britain  and 
France  in  1916.i 

In  the  Arabic- speaking  portions  of  the  Ottoman  Empire 
a  special  regime,  with  Great  Britain  as  mandatory,  was  pro- 
vided for  Palestine  alone  by  the  treaty  of  Sevres.  The 
Hedjaz,  Mesopotamia,  and  Syria  were  to  be  independent. 
The  manner  in  which  this  independence  was  to  be  safe- 
guarded was  provided  for  in  article  XXII  of  the  covenant 
of  the  League  of  Nations,  which  formed,  as  in  the  other 
treaties,  the  first  section  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres.  The 
language  of  article  XXII  does  not  seem  capable  of  misin- 
terpretation.   It  reads: 

**  Certain  communities  formerly  belonging  to  the  Turkish 
empire  have  reached  a  stage  of  development  where  their 
existence  as  independent  nations  can  be  provisionally  rec- 
ognized subject  to  the  rendering  of  administrative  advice 
and  assistance  by  a  Mandatory  until  such  time  as  they  are 
able  to  stand  alone.  The  wishes  of  these  communities  must 
be  a  principal  consideration  in  the  selection  of  the  Man- 
datory. *  * 

The  article  further  provides  that  the  mandatory's 
authority  ''shall,  if  not  previously  agreed  upon  by  the 
members  of  the  League,  be  expHcitty  defined  in  each  case 
by  the  Council";  that  the  mandatory  shall  render  to  the 
Council  an  annual  report;  and  that  a  permanent  commis- 
sion "shall  be  constituted  to  receive  and  examine  the  an- 
nual reports  of  the  Mandatories  and  to  advise  the  Council 
on  all  matters  relating  to  the  observance  of  the  mandates. ' ' 

Had  the  mandate  idea  been  put  into  practice,  it  would 
have  been  a  departure  in  world  policies.    Bearing  the  white 

"  See  p.  378. 


438         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

man's  burden  had  long  been  the  hypocritical  cloak  for  im- 
perialism, but  it  was  reasonable  to  suppose  that  a  begin- 
ning could  be  made  in  substituting  the  big  brother  for  the 
big  stick.  But  the  Entente  statesmen  had  agreed  to  the 
mandate  proposal  at  Paris  as  a  subterfuge  for  evading 
their  war  promises  to  the  subject  peoples  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire  and  as  a  means  of  annexing  the  German  colonies 
without  accounting  for  this  booty  in  the  indemnity  reckon- 
ing with  Germany.^  In  the  Near  East,  as  well  as  in  China, 
the  Pacific,  and  Africa,  the  Entente  powers  were  bound 
to  one  another  to  divide  the  spoils  of  war  in  accordance 
with  the  terms  of  secret  treaties.  Their  premiers  con- 
fronted President  Wilson  at  Paris  with  the  argument  that 
the  war  had  been  fought  to  assure  the  inviolability  of  inter- 
national engagements,  and  that  the  necessity  of  fulfilling 
these  transcended  the  ''fourteen  points."  It  was  asserted, 
also,  that  the  secret  treaties  were  none  the  less  sacred  be- 
cause of  later  international  engagements,  such  as  the  pre- 
armistice  agreement  with  Germany,  the  promises  to  sub- 
ject races,  and  even  the  texts  of  the  treaties  concluded  at 
Paris. 

Russia  and  Italy  were  not  interested  in  the  Arabic- 
speaking  portions  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  and  the  division 
of  these  regions  was  a  matter  that  concerned  only  Great 
Britain  and  France.  Knowing  the  danger  of  allowing  mis- 
understandings to  arise,  the  British  Foreign  Office  and  the 
French  Ministry  of  Foreign  Affairs  in  1916  arranged  their 
future  spheres  of  influence  in  Asiatic  Turkey  by  the  Sykes- 
Picot  agreement.  The  complete  collapse  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire,  and  the  spheres  of  influence  of  Russia  and  Italy 
in  other  parts  of  the  empire,  were  presupposed.  Therefore 
the  line  between  the  French  and  British  spheres  was  drawn 
on  the  calculation  that  France  would  have  the  southeastern 
part  of  Asia  Minor.    The  French  were  persuaded  to  agree 

*  Former  Secretary  Lansing  is  of  this  opinion,  and  the  writer's  own  sources 
of  information  confijm  it.    See  Lansing's  "The  Peace  Negotiations,"  p.  61. 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES  (1920-1922)  439 

to  the  division  of  Syria,  Palestine  going  to  Great  Britain. 
France  was  to  have  the  rest  of  Syria  and  Great  Britain 
Mesopotamia.  British  agents,  however,  had  already  prom- 
ised the  shereef  of  Mecca  that  if  he  would  rebel  against  the 
sultan.  Great  Britain  would  sponsor  the  formation  of  an 
Arabic  empire,  including  all  the  Arabic-speaking  parts  of 
Turkey.  The  border  districts  to  be  regarded  as  Arab  were 
specified.  In  1917,  when  the  aid  of  the  Arabs  was  sorely 
needed  in  Mesopotamia  and  in  Palestine,  these  promises 
were  reiterated,  despite  their  conflict  with  the  Sykes-Picot 
agreement. 

When  the  armistice  was  declared,  Great  Britain  found 
herself  in  the  embarrassing  position  of  having  promised 
the  same  territories  to  different  people.  By  the  Sykes- 
Picot  agreement,  Syria,  including  Damascus,  was  to  go  to 
France,  and  by  the  Balfour  declaration  of  November  2, 
1917,  the  British  cabinet  had  promised  to  make  Palestine 
'*a  national  home"  for  the  Jews.  British  generals  in 
Mesopotamia  had  also  been  prodigal  in  their  promises  of 
''complete  independence"  to  several  Arab  tribal  rulers. 
On  the  other  hand,  they  had  just  as  definitely  promised 
the  Damascus  region  and  Mesopotamia  to  the  shereef  of 
Mecca,  whom  they  had  made  king  of  the  Hedjaz;  and  be- 
fore the  conquest  of  Palestine,  which  would  have  been 
impossible  without  his  aid,  they  had  told  King  Hussein  that 
they  would  respect  the  holy  places  of  Islam  and  would 
allow  complete  political  and  religious  liberty  to  the  inhabit- 
ants of  Palestine.  This  pledge  could  not  be  observed  with- 
out repudiating  the  interpretation  that  the  Zionist  leaders 
had  been  allowed  to  make  of  the  Balfour  declaration. 

Emir  Feisal,  son  of  King  Hussein,  represented  the  Hed- 
jaz, recognized  as  an  independent  state,  at  the  Paris  con- 
ference; and  the  Hedjaz  was  a  signatory  of  the  treaty  of 
Versailles.  Its  name  appeared  among  the  contracting 
powers  in  the  treaty  of  Sevres,  and  the  Hedjaz  was  a 
charter  member  of  the  League  of  Nations.    But,  before  the 


V 


440         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

signature  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres,  Feisal,  who  had  installed 
himself  in  Damascus  in  accordance  with  the  British  under- 
standing, was  driven  out  by  the  French,  whose  action  was 
prompt  and  decisive.  The  quarrel  was  not  referred  to  the 
League  of  Nations  as  provided  for  by  treaties  to  which 
France  and  the  Hedjaz  were  co-signatories.  The  British, 
failing  to  extend  their  administrative  control  over  Mesopo- 
tamia by  armed  force,  compensated  Feisal,  the  enemy  of 
France,  by  making  him  ruler  of  Bagdad  under  the  title  of 
king  of  the  Irak,  a  region  whose  boundaries  touched  those 
of  Syria,  from  which  the  French  had  driven  Feisal.  French 
public  opinion  believes  that  the  *' disloyalty"  of  the  British 
in  Syria  freed  them  from  the  obligation  of  conferring  with 
the  British  before  signing  the  treaty  of  Angora. 

In  the  parts  of  the  former  Ottoman  Empire  that  they 
occupy  Great  Britain  and  France  have  ignored  the  man- 
date principle.  They  have  not  consulted  the  wishes  of  the 
inhabitants,  and  from  the  beginning  they  have  never  con- 
sidered that  they  derived  their  authority  from  the  League 
of  Nations.  Their  occupation  of  the  supposed  mandated 
territories,  which  are  "provisionally  recognized  as  inde- 
pendent nations,"  is  a  military  occupation,  maintained  by 
constant  fighting  and  political  repression.  They  can  not 
report  to  a  commission  of  the  League  progress  in  the  ''ren- 
dering of  administrative  advice  and  assistance,"  because 
they  have  no  intention  of  merely  helping,  ''until  such  a  time 
as  they  are  able  to  stand  alone,"  the  people  over  whom 
they  are  ruling. 

The  recognition  of  the  independence  of  the  Hedjaz  and 
!  the  creation  of  the  kingdom  of  Irak  have  made  the  position 
'  of  the  British  on  the  other  side  of  the  Red  Sea  precarious, 
if  not  untenable.  The  Egyptians  refused  to  accept  the 
British  protectorate  provided  by  the  treaty  of  Sevres, 
claiming  that  the  protectorate  violated  the  treaty  of  Lon- 
don (1840)  and  was  in  contradiction  to  the  assurances 
given  by  British  statesmen  to  the  Egyptians  and  the  world 


THE  TREATY  OF  SEVRES   (1920-1922)  441 

from  the  time  of  the  occupation  down  to  and  including  the 
World  War.  The  Palestinians  are  equally  recalcitrant, 
and  refuse  to  be  sacrificed  either  to  the  exigencies  of  British 
world  policy  or  to  the  fulfilment  of  the  Balfour  declaration. 
Farther  north,  the  Syrians  are  making  the  French  occupa- 
tion exceedingly  costly.  In  Egypt,  Palestine,  and  Syria  ' 
the  authority  of  the  British  and  French  extends  in  the 
spring  of  1922  only  as  far  as  their  guns  carry.  Not  only 
are  they  having  difficulty  with  the  inhabitants  of  the  coun- 
tries they  seized,  but  their  relations  with  each  other  have 
changed  from  the  cordiality  of  comrades-in-arms  to  the 
suspiciousness  and  dislike  of  political  rivals  and  commer- 
cial competitors. 


CHAPTER  XL 

THE    EEESTABLISHMENT    OF    PEACE    PEEVENTED    BY    UNSATIS- 
FIED   NATIONALIST    ASPIKATIONS    AND    DIVERGENT 
POLICIES   OF   THE   VICTORS    (1918-1922) 

AS  far  as  enemy  states  were  concerned,  the  armistices 
— with  Bulgaria,  September  28 ;  with  Turkey,  October 
30 ;  with  Austria-Hungary,  November  3 ;  and  with  Germany, 
November  11 — ended  the  World  War.  The  drastic  terms 
of  the  Allies  were  accepted  without  equivocation,  and  there 
was  no  opposition  to  any  measures  taken  to  put  them  into 
effect.  Except  in  Turkey,  the  victors  made  the  stipulations 
and  took  the  precautionary  measures  necessary  to  prevent 
a  renewal  of  hostilities  on  the  part  of  the  vanquished. 
During  the  years  immediately  following  the  World  War, 
therefore,  Germany,  Austria,  Hungary,  and  Bulgaria  were 
powerless  to  disturb  the  peace.  From  a  diplomatic  as  well 
as  a  military  point  of  view,  these  four  states  counted  for 
nothing  in  international  relations.  Their  armies  were  dis- 
banded, their  navies  were  destroyed,  their  fortresses  were 
dismantled  or  were  occupied  by  allied  garrisons,  their  mili- 
tary equipment,  from  huge  cannon  and  airplanes  down  to 
uniforms  and  shoes,  passed  into  the  hands  of  their  enemies, 
their  citizens  were  refused  passports  for  travel,  and  their 
embassies  and  legations  and  consulates  remained  closed  in 
almost  every  country  of  the  world. 

As  we  have  seen,  the  vanquished  were  excluded  from  a 
voice  in  the  deliberations  of  the  peace  conference,  and  when 
their  plenipotentiaries  were  summoned  to  Paris  to  sign 
treaties  that  represented  the  desires  and  ideas  of  their 
conquerors,  they  were  shut  up  under  guard  and  not  allowed 
to  communicate,  much  less  exchange  opinions,  with  the  dele- 

442 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)       443 

gates  or  the  press  correspondents  of  the  victorious  powers. 
This  diplomatic  exclusion  continued  for  more  than  two 
years  after  the  treaty  of  Versailles  went  into  force.  In  the 
various  political  and  economic  conferences,  and  in  the  meet- 
ings of  the  League  of  Nations,  former  enemy  states  and 
Russia  played  no  part.^ 

The  failure  to  reestablish  peace  can  not  be  imputed  to  an 
inconclusive  victory  that  left  the  victors  in  no  position  to 
impose  their  will  upon  the  vanquished.  Nor  were  recon- 
struction and  rehabilitation  throughout  the  w^orld  retarded 
through  opportunities  offered  to  the  defeated  powers  (ex- 
cept Turkey)  to  fish  in  troubled  waters.  They  were  unable 
to  escape  the  consequences  of  their  defeat  by  dividing  the 
victors  during  the  peace  negotiations  or  by  ahenating  small 
states  from  the  bloc  of  their  enemies  through  direct  con- 
cessions and  bribes  of  economic  advantages.  The  reestab- 
lishment  of  peace  was  prevented  by  unsatisfied  nationalist 
aspirations  of  the  small  states  and  by  divergent  policies  of 
the  five  principal  allied  and  associated  powers. 

An  examination  of  the  main  features  of  the  five  treaties 
and  of  the  problems  to  which  they  gave  rise  has  shown  that 
the  recent  World  War  did  not  accomplish  the  change  that 
was  hoped  for  in  the  character  of  international  relations. 
In  the  policies  they  advocated,  statesmen  continued  to  have 
a  national,  not  an  international,  vision.  Their  object  was 
the  aggrandizement  of  the  nation  they  represented,  their 
justification  the  security  and  prosperity  of  their  own  coun- 
try, and  their  criterion  the  force  at  their  disposal.  Before 
the  conference  opened,  Premier  Clemenceau  summed  up 
this  conception  of  a  statesman's  duties  when  he  explained 
to  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  that  he  would  go  into  the  con- 
ference with  a  maximum  and  a  minimum  program,  with  the 
sole  idea  of  getting  for  France  as  much  as  he  could.    From 

*  The  economic  conference  at  Genoa,  in  April,  1922,  was  the  first  official 
international  gathering  since  the  war  in  which  Germans  and  Bussians  sat  with 
the  delegates  of  the  other  powers.     See  p,  559, 


444         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

January,  1919,  to  January,  1922,  beginning  at  Paris  and 
continuing  until  Washington,  the  victors  held  conference 
after  conference  for  the  ostensible  purpose  of  establishing 
a  new  world  order.  But,  unfortunately,  what  they  really 
had  in  mind  were  the  interests  of  their  own  nations ;  and, 
since  the  elimination  of  Germany  and  Russia  gave  them 
opportunities  for  the  development  of  their  world  policies 
such  as  they  had  not  enjoyed  before,  the  principal  alhed 
and  associated  powers  gradually  drifted  from  the  soli- 
darity of  comradeship-in-arms  into  conflict  among  them- 
selves over  the  spoils  of  the  war. 

In  considering  the  ''spoils  of  the  war,"  we  must  guard 
against  the  mistake  of  placing  too  great  emphasis  upon  ter- 
ritorial gains  and  indemnities.  Under  twentieth-century 
political  and  economic  conditions,  the  extension  of  sover- 
eignty over  new  territories  and  the  payment  of  indemnities 
are  not  indisputably  advantageous  to  powers  victorious  in 
war.  In  fact,  these  traditional  rewards  to  the  victors  are 
likely  to  prove  positively  harmful.  The  new  territories 
may  bring  internal  and  international  complications  and 
military  and  financial  burdens,  and  the  indemnities  may 
hurt  commerce  and  retard  industry.  The  greatest  assets  of 
victory  are  gains  that  tend  directly  to  increase  the  security 
and  prosperity  of  the  victors. 

In  almost  every  case,  the  cessions  of  territory  and  the 
indemnities  provided  for  in  the  terms  dictated  to  the  enemy 
were  prompted  by  strategic  and  economic  considerations. 
The  framers  of  the  treaties  had  two  objects  in  mind:  to 
render  the  vanquished  powers  militarily  impotent,  and  to 
destroy  them  as  trade  competitors.  Into  the  treaty  with 
Turkey  a  third  object  entered:  to  divide  as  much  of  the 
Ottoman  dominions  as  possible  into  exclusive  spheres  of 
influence  among  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy.  The 
emancipated  peoples,  therefore,  although  erected  into  in- 
dependent states,  joined  to  neighboring  states,  or  put  under 
the  tutelage  of  the  different  powers  as  mandated  territo- 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS   (1918-1922)       445 

ries,  had  a  string  attached  to  their  liberty ;  in  return  for  the 
gift  of  emancipation,  they  were  to  fight  for,  trade  with,  and 
open  up  their  countries  to  the  mining  and  industrial  enter- 
prises of  the  victorious  powers. 

In  making  the  treaties  and  in  taking  measures  to  enforce 
them,  however,  divergent  opinions  and  policies  arose  among 
the  framers  of  the  treaties  because  they  were  to  one  an- 
other what  the  central  empires  had  been — a  potential  men- 
ace and  actual  trade  competitors.  In  the  conferences  that 
succeeded  the  common  victory  of  the  autumn  of  1918  the 
surviving  powers  have  been  thinking  of  one  another  and 
have  acted  towards  one  another  as  they  thought  and  acted 
towards  Germany,  Austria-Hungary,  and  Eussia  in  pre-war 
days.  The  destruction  of  the  balance  of  power  has  made 
necessary  a  revision  of  the  strategic  and  economic  policies 
of  each  of  the  remaining  great  powers.  Instead  of  har- 
mony and  cooperation,  there  have  been  jealousy,  suspicion, 
and  keen  competition  for  the  political  and  economic  spoils 
of  the  war.  The  principal  and  allied  associated  powers 
have  been  unable  to  come  to  an  equitable  understanding 
concerning  each  participant's  share  in  the  advantages  ac- 
cruing from  the  victory.  Divergent  needs  and  ambitions 
have  resulted  in  divergent  policies. 

The  European  balance  of  power,  as  it  existed  in  1914, 
was  the  result  of  centuries  of  political  evolution.  Each 
great  political  organism  had  its  essential  place  and  served 
as  a  check  upon  the  others.  Because  of  Russia  and  France, 
Germany  could  not  absorb  the  Hapsburg  empire.  Because 
of  Russia,  Germany  feared  to  attack  France.  Austria- 
Hungary  and  Russia  kept  each  other  from  penetrating  the 
Balkan  peninsula.  France  and  Germany  made  possible  the 
creation  and  independent  existence  of  Belgium,  and  both 
of  these  powers  vitally  contributed  to  the  unification  of 
Italy.  Italy  profited  for  half  a  century  by  being  able  to 
hold  the  balance  of  power  in  Europe  between  Germany  and 
France,  and  in  the  Mediterranean  between  France  and 


446         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  AVORLD  POLITICS 

Great  Britain.  The  increasing  strength  of  Germany  pre- 
vented Russia  from  attacking  Austria-Hungary,  just  as 
the  increasing  strength  of  Russia  prevented  Germany  from 
keeping  France  intimidated.  The  remarkable  growth  and 
prosperity  of  Germany  aided  British  commerce  on  the  con- 
tinent, and  acted  as  a  deterrent  wlien  France  was  eager  to 
fight  Great  Britain.  It  was  a  commonplace  of  European 
diplomacy  that  if  Austria-Hungary  had  not  existed,  this 
political  organism  would  have  had  to  be  created  in  order  to 
preserve  the  peace  of  Europe.  It  will  readily  be  seen  that 
the  collapse  of  the  Austro-Hungarian  and  Russian  empires 
and  the  military  and  economic  prostration  of  Germany 
gave  rise  to  new  problems  that  inevitably  led  to  disagree- 
ment among  British,  French,  and  Italians.  Since  the  in- 
terests of  these  three  peoples  w^ere  conflicting  in  the  matter 
of  the  reconstruction  of  Europe,  the  danger  of  divergent 
policies  leading  to  misunderstandings  soon  became  ap- 
parent. 

The  disturbing  effect  of  the  permanent  elimination  of 
Austria-Hungary  and  the  temporary  exclusion  of  Germany 
and  Russia  from  a  share  in  shaping  the  destinies  of  Europe 
was  not  limited  to  European  reconstruction.  In  various 
crises  between  1878  and  1914  the  European  and  world  situ- 
ation of  the  great  powers  proved  to  be  interdependent. 
Wars  between  European  states  and  the  subjugation  of 
weak  nations  outside  Europe  w^ere  frequently  prevented  by 
the  distribution  of  the  balance  of  power.  No  great  power 
attempted  to  repeat  Russia's  effort  to  encroach  upon  the 
Ottoman  Empire,  for,  after  San  Stefano,^  it  was  realized 
that  the  powers  were  ready  to  combine  against  a  despoiler 
of  Turkey.  The  World  War  reopened  the  Near  Eastern 
question,  and,  with  Germany  and  Russia  out  of  the  calcu- 
lations. Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  inevitably  became 
bitter  rivals,  not  only  for  the  Ottoman  succession,  but  also 
for  paramount  influence  in  countries  bordering  on  Turkey. 

^  See  p.  48. 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)       447 

In  the  Far  East,  Russia  ceased  to  be  a  checkmate  to  Japan. 
Germany,  too,  no  longer  stood  in  Japan's  way,  and  the 
Entente  powers  soon  came  to  realize  that  their  ally,  Japan, 
was  proving  a  far  greater  menace  to  their  security  and 
prosperity  in  the  Far  East  than  Germany  ever  could  have 
been.  The  withdrawal  of  czarist  Russia,  with  which  British 
diplomats  knew  how  to  deal,  left  Persia  and  Afghanistan 
open  to  a  propaganda  against  British  influence  that  could 
not  be  checked. 

The  unsatisfied  nationalist  aspirations  of  small  nations 
and  subject  peoples  made  impossible  a  durable  world  peace 
on  the  basis  of  the  settlements  arranged  at  Paris.  These 
aspirations  were  not  always  legitimate  or  practicable,  and 
frequently  there  was  a  conflict  between  the  claims  of  the 
various  peoples  aspiring  to  independence.  Therefore  all 
could  not  be  satisfied,  and  recognition  by  the  principal 
allied  and  associated  powers  of  some  of  the  nationalist 
aspirations  to  which  they  refused  to  listen  would  undoubt- 
edly have  resulted  in  as  much  injustice  and  political  insta- 
bility as  already  existed  because  of  the  conditions  against 
which  weak  states  and  subject  nations  protested.  Com- 
promises and  disappointments  were  inevitable. 

But  these  compromises  were  not  made  upon  the  basis  of 
adjusting  as  equitably  as  possible  the  rival  claims  of  small 
states  or  of  finding  a  modus  vivendi  for  subject  peoples 
that  conformed  to  their  own  best  interests  and  that  would 
lead  to  the  realization  of  reasonable  and  legitimate  aspira- 
tions. In  Europe,  and  outside  Europe,  nationalist  aspira- 
tions were  used  by  the  statesmen  of  victorious  powers  to 
advance  their  own  interests,  frequently  by  wringing  con- 
cessions from,  or  attempting  to  block  the  aims  of,  former 
comrades-in-arms.  A  paradox  or  a  vicious  circle  has  been 
established:  because  of  the  divergent  policies  of  the  prin- 
cipal allied  powers  the  aspirations  of  small  states  and  sub- 
ject peoples  were  not  realized  at  the  Paris  conference,  and 
because  these  aspirations  were  not  satisfied  within  reason- 


448         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

able  and  practicable  limits,  the  policies  of  the  principal 
allied  powers,  since  the  peace  conference,  have  become 
more  divergent. 

Concrete  illustrations  can  be  given  to  demonstrate  that 
the  statesmen  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  have 
quarreled  because  of  world  politics  since  the  war  in  the 
same  way  as  during  crises  before  the  war,  and  that  the 
recent  cooperation  during  a  long  and  costly  struggle  has 
not  created  bonds  of  friendship  among  the  peoples  of  the 
allied  nations  strong  enough  to  prevail  against  the  bitter- 
ness and  selfishness  and  fear  accruing  from  the  concep- 
tions and  pursuit  of  world  politics. 

Always  keeping  in  mind  the  two  preoccupations  of  for- 
eign policy,  security  and  prosperity,  w^e  find  that  the  war 
gave  Great  Britain  and  Italy  satisfaction,  in  so  far  as  the 
enemy  states  were  concerned,  on  the  score  of  security. 
Great  Britain  achieved  the  destruction  of  the  German  navy 
and  the  virtual  banishment  from  the  high  seas  of  the  Ger- 
man merchant  marine;  Italy  achieved  the  destruction  of 
the  Austro-Hungarian  Empire.  France,  on  the  other  hand, 
still  faced  a  Germany  numerically  stronger  than  herself  and 
better  equipped  industrially  to  manufacture  the  widely 
varied  implements  of  war,  which  now  included  airplanes 
and  poison  gases,  both  indistinguishable  in  time  of  peace  as 
military  weapons. 

Under  these  circumstances,  France  felt  that  her  national 
security  depended  upon  the  permanent  political  and  eco- 
nomic disability,  in  the  family  of  nations,  of  her  great  foe. 
The  policy  of  France  was  to  alienate  as  much  territory  as 
possible  from  Germany,  either  by  taking  it  herself  or  giv- 
ing it  to  others;  to  prevent  the  voice  of  Germany  from 
being  heard  in  the  League  of  Nations  or  any  other  inter- 
national conference;  and  either  to  break  up  the  unity  of 
the  German  Empire  or  to  put  the  German  people  into 
economic  servitude.  The  means  of  accomplishing  these 
purposes  were:  (1)  permanent  retention  of  the  territories 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)      449 

occupied  under  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles;  (2) 
keeping  Austria  from  joining  Germany;  (3)  including 
within  the  frontiers  of  Poland  as  much  German  territory 
as  possible,  notably  the  great  industrial  region  of  upper 
Silesia;  (4)  creating  as  extensive  a  Poland  as  possible, 
which,  in  return  for  French  support,  would  agree  to  main- 
tain a  large  standing  armj^  to  replace  Russia  as  France's 
ally;  and  (5)  making  and  interpreting  and  enforcing  the 
reparations  terms  of  the  treaty  with  the  view  of  frustrat- 
ing whatever  attempts  Germany  might  make  for  political 
and  economic  rehabilitation. 

In  getting  much  of  what  they  wanted  into  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  the  French  had  been  aided  by  the  foolish  elec- 
toral promise  "to  make  Germany  pay"  of  Mr.  Lloyd 
George,  in  December,  1918,  and  by  the  need  of  Great  Brit- 
ain and  Italy  to  call  upon  France  frequently  against  the 
United  States  or,  more  correctlj'',  against  President  Wilson. 
The  French  did  not  win  the  left  bank  of  the  Ehine  and  a 
clear  title  for  themselves  to  the  Saar  Basin,  nor  did  they 
get  for  Poland  Danzig,  certain  large  districts  of  east  and 
west  Prussia  and  upper  Silesia.  But  they  did  secure  the 
right  to  continue  the  occupation  of  the  Rhine  provinces,  to 
control  the  internal  policies  of  the  German  government, 
and  to  exclude  Germany  from  international  conferences 
until  the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  were  fulfilled.^ 
This,  of  course,  meant  the  Greek  kalends  unless  there  were 
a  revision,  or  at  least  a  series  of  modifications,  when  it 
was  discovered  that  Germany  could  not  literally  fulfil  all 
the  clauses  of  the  treaty,  such  as  trial  of  war  criminals, 
disbanding  of  gendarmerie,  and  the  payment  of  reparation 
sums  demanded. 

Since  the  signing  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  France,  on 
the  ground  of  security,  has  stood  for  its  strict  fulfilment, 
even  when  it  was  acknowledged  that  the  terms  could  not  be 
fulfilled.     In  the  latter  case,  France  has  announced  her 

^See  Chapter  XLVI. 


450         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

intention  to  proceed  to  exercise  the  sanctions  provided  for 
in  case  of  non-fulfilment :  retention  of  the  left  bank  Rhine 
provinces;  occupation  of  additional  German  territory, 
notably  the  Ruhr  Basin,  which  contains  most  of  Germany's 
remaining  coal  and  her  greatest  industries ;  and  seizure  of 
the  customs  of  German  ports  and  frontier  cities,  in  this 
way  reducing  Germany  to  the  position  of  China  and 
Turkey. 

But  what  the  French  deem  necessary  for  their  security 
the  British  and  Italians  realize  is  disastrous  to  their  pros- 
perity. The  treaty  of  Versailles  is  not  drastic  enough  for 
the  French :  it  is  too  drastic  for  the  British  and  Italians.* 
For  this  reason  the  French  have  encouraged  and  the  British 
and  Italians  have  discouraged  a  separatist  movement  in 
the  Rhine  provinces  and  the  imperialism  of  the  Poles.  Mr. 
Lloyd  George,  during  the  conference,  opposed  the  incor- 
poration in  Poland  of  German  districts  and  the  mad  desire 
of  the  Poles  to  extend  their  frontiers  to  the  northeast,  the 
east,  and  the  southeast,  at  the  expense  of  Lithuanians 
Russians,  and  Ukrainians.  He  was  consistent  in  this  oppo 
sition  during  the  crises  that  followed  the  creation  of  Poland 
and  throughout  the  development  of  the  upper  Silesian 
question. 

The  British  premier  had  the  support  of  the  Italians. 
British  and  Italian  statesmen  and  public  opinion  realized 
that  normal  business  conditions  and  commercial  prosperity 
could  be  reestablished  only  through  the  economic  rehabili- 

^  The  widely  circulated  book  by  J.  M.  Keynes,  * '  The  Economic  Consequences 
of  the  Peace,"  which  appeared  in  1920,  was  roundly  condemned  by  able 
American  scholars  who  had  been  experts  attached  to  the  American  Commission 
to  Negotiate  Peace.  Events  have  proved,  however,  that  Mr.  Keynes,  who  had 
been  the  representative  of  the  British  treasury  at  the  Paris  conference,  really 
set  forth  the  prevailing  governmental  view  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles.  Simi- 
larly, in  the  autumn  of  1921,  former  Premier  Nitti  of  Italy  published  a  book, 
"L'Europa  senza  Pace,"  denouncing,  as  Mr.  Keynes  had  done,  the  terms 
of  the  treaty  of  Versailles  as  unjust  and  impracticable,  and  pointing  out 
their  blighting  effect  on  the  restoration  of  peace  and  prosperity  in  Europe. 
Mr.  Keynes  has  just  published  a  second  volume  in  which  he  confesses  that 
his  earlier  pessimism  has  not  been  fully  justified,  but  he  reiterates  the 
need  for  revision. 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)      451 

tation  oj  central  Europe.  In  the  long  run  the  payment  of 
reparations,  either  in  goods  supplied  directly  to  them  or 
in  money  derived  from  the  sale  of  goods  in  extra-European 
markets,  would  hurt  them  far  more  than  the  amounts  they 
received  from  the  reparations.  Therefore  they  gradually 
withdrew  their  support  from  France,  condemning  her  atti- 
tude towards  Germany  and  her  encouragement  of  Poland. 
When  the  upper  Silesian  question  was  finally  settled  on 
the  basis  of  division  of  the  disputed  territory,  in  which 
Poland  was  favored,  the  British  and  Italian  press  did  not 
attempt  to  conceal  the  dissatisfaction  and  misgivings 
aroused  by  persistence  in  the  policy  that  could  be  explained 
by  no  other  motive  than  that  of  rendering  Germany  impo- 
tent to  meet  the  reparation  payments. 

In  the  political  and  economic  conferences,  often  confined 
to  the  premiers  of  the  three  powers,  which  followed  in 
rapid  succession  the  initial  attempts  to  enforce  the  treaty 
of  Versailles  and  to  interpret  and  complete  the  other 
treaties,  the  French  and  British  bargained  with  each  other, 
France  gaining  the  assent  of  Great  Britain  to  the  policy 
of  threatening  Germany  in  exchange  for  granting  the 
British  a  freer  hand  in  the  Near  East.  After  Italy  had 
adjusted  her  Adriatic  difficulties  with  the  Jugo-Slavs,  this 
method  of  compromise  did  not  appeal  to  her;  she  had  noth- 
ing to  bargain  about !  But  between  the  conference  of  San 
Remo  in  the  spring  of  1920  and  that  of  Cannes  in  the  early 
days  of  1922  the  internal  situation  in  Great  Britain  had 
made  her  statesmen  less  keen  about  scoring  diplomatic 
advantages  outside  Europe  and  much  more  insistent  upon 
relieving  the  intolerable  situation  of  central  Europe  and 
avoiding  the  competition  of  German  goods  by  loosening  the 
screws  applied  to  the  German  government.  Unemploy- 
ment was  a  great  problem  in  England.  Trade  relations  had 
to  be  resumed  with  central  and  eastern  Europe,  and  British 
merchants  could  no  longer,  for  the  sake  of  France,  envisage 
with  equanimity  any  policy  that  would  result  in  the  flood- 


452         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ing  of  the  markets  of  the  world  with  cheap  German  goods. 
The  same  feeling  prevailed  in  Italy.  After  all,  Great 
Britain  and  Italy  had  much  less  interest  in  the  indemnities 
from  Germany  than  had  France. 

When  France  found  that  she  could  no  longer  count  upon? 
British  and  Italian  cooperation  in,  or  even  diplomatic  ap- 
proval of,  her  plans  to  seize  the  Ruhr  Basin  and  the  custom- 
houses of  Germany  following  the  refusal  or  inability  of 
Berlin  to  meet  the  stipulated  indemnity  payments.  Presi- 
dent Millerand  invited  former  President  Poincare  to  form 
an  avowedly  nationalist  cabinet  to  replace  the  ministry  of 
M.  Briand,  who  had  been  temporizing  with  Great  Britain 
at  Washington  and  Cannes.^  But  the  French  ministry  of 
foreign  affairs  had  broken  loose  from  the  entente  cordiale 
months  before,  and  had  opened  a  definite  breach  in  the 
seemingly  harmonious  diplomatic  front  of  the  Entente 
powers  by  negotiating  a  separate  peace  with  the  Kemalist 
Turkish  government  at  Angora.  This  agreement  abro- 
gated, as  far  as  France  was  concerned,  fundamental  terms 
of  the  treaty  of  Sevres  and  the  mandate  clauses  of  the 
covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations.  Up  to  this  time  France 
had  not  accepted  the  mandate  principle,  either  in  letter  or 
spirit;  but  the  Angora  treaty  was  the  first  instance  of  a 
denial  of  the  common  partnership  of  the  principal  allied 
and  associated  powers  in  extra-European  territories  ceded 
to  them  collectively  by  Germany  and  Turkey. 

The  Paris  treaties  left  unsatisfied  throughout  the  world 
the  nationalist  aspirations  of  friends  as  well  as  of  foes. 
Of  the  succession  states  of  Austria-Hungary,  Italy  fared 

*  In  the  second  week  of  January,  1922,  M.  Briand,  called  back  to  Paris 
from  the  Cannes  conference  by  a  political  crisis,  defended  energetically  and 
with  seeming  success  his  policies  before  the  Chamber  of  Deputies.  Although 
he  might  have  obtained  a  vote  of  confidence,  he  resigned  because  President 
Millerand  told  him  that  the  country  did  not  approve  of  his  concessions  to 
the  British.  Commenting  on  the  resignation  of  M.  Briand,  M.  Viviani  said 
that  it  was  impossible  for  a  statesman  to  attempt  to  manage  French  foreign 
affairs  on  the  basis  of  what  was  practicable,  in  view  of  the  radical  difference 
of  opinion  with  Great  Britain  on  the  question  of  how  Germany  should  be 
treated. 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)       453 

best.  But  even  she  had  to  compromise  with  the  Jugo-Slavs. 
The  treaty  of  Rapallo,  ratified  by  Italy  on  November  27, 
1920,  although  it  gave  Italy  most  of  what  she  had  claimed, 
satisfied  the  Italian  nationalists  scarcely  more  than  it  did 
the  Jugo-Slavs.  Czecho-Slovakia  contained  large  alien 
elements,  separated  arbitrarily  from  their  German,  Aus- 
trian, and  Hungarian  kin  in  neighboring  countries.  Ru- 
mania and  Serbia  differed  on  the  division  of  the  banat  of 
Temesvar.  Poland  secured,  partly  by  French  backing  and 
partly  by  force  of  arms  in  defiance  of  the  Entente  powers 
and  the  League  of  Nations,  large  portions  of  Lithuanian, 
Russian,  and  Ukrainian  territory.  From  Bulgaria  were 
taken  regions  inhabited  entirely  by  people  of  their  own 
tongue,  who  claimed  to  be  Bulgarians.  In  violation  of  the 
explicit  terms  of  article  XXII  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles, 
the  Arabic-speaking  portions  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  with 
the  exception  of  the  Hedjaz,  were  divided  between  Great 
Britain  and  France.  The  treaty  of  Versailles  compelled 
Germany  to  recognize  the  British  protectorate  over  Egypt 
and  the  transfer  of  German  rights  in  Shantung  to  Japan, 
although  Egyptians  and  Chinese  were  not  consulted  and 
obdurately  refused  to  submit  to  this  disregard  of  their 
sovereign  rights.  Persia  was  denied  a  hearing  at  the  peace 
conference,  but  in  August,  1919,  was  compelled  by  the 
British  to  sign  a  treaty  virtually  establishing  a  protecto- 
rate, which  was  afterwards  repudiated  when  the  British 
government  found  that  it  could  no  longer  keep  troops  in 
Persia. 

At  the  peace  conference  and  afterwards  the  aspirations 
of  the  Arabs,  Syrians,  Palestinians,  Egyptians,  Persians, 
and  Chinese,  although  they  had  been  encouraged  during 
the  war,  as  set  forth  by  the  Allies  in  their  joint  response  to 
bribes  in  the  deliberations  of  the  principal  allied  and  asso- 
ciated powers.  In  a  manner  more  disguised,  but  not  less 
effective  and  for  the  same  purposes,  the  peoples  of  the 
Hapsburg  and  Romanoff  empires,  and  also  the  Albanians 


454         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  Greeks,  were  favored  or  militated  against  according 
to  the  exigencies  of  the  world  policies  of  the  world  powers. 

That  their  own  interests  and  not  the  merits  of  the  case 
shaped  the  decisions  of  the  principal  allied  and  associated 
powers  is  most  clearly  shown  in  the  shifting  attitude  of 
Great  Britain  and  France  towards  the  Armenians,  Greeks, 
and  Turks  since  the  conclusion  of  the  war. 

Because  of  their  unexampled  sufferings,  the  Entente 
powers  promised  to  avenge  the  Armenians  and  protect 
them,  even  if  they  were  unable  to  assure  them  indepen- 
dence, in  case  of  victory.  This  was  one  of  the  objects  of 
the  war  by  definite  promises,  were  used  as  threats  and 
President  Wilson's  disconcerting  inquiry  at  the  end  of 
1916.  The  Armenians  were  encouraged  to  enlist  in  the 
Entente  armies,  and  were  formed  into  separate  battalions 
by  Russians,-  French,  and  British.  Like  the  Arabs,  they 
fought  against  their  oppressors,  and  after  the  armistice 
with  Turkey  they  were  used  by  the  French  in  Cilicia  and 
by  the  British  in  the  Caucasus  to  help  pacify  and  police 
occupied  territories.  But  when  changed  conditions  ielse- 
where  suggested  a  modification  of  the  original  plans  of  the 
victors,  the  Armenians  were  deserted  by  both  the  British 
and  the  French,  and  in  the  treaty  of  Angora  the  French 
handed  Cilicia  back  to  Turkey,  with  no  adequate  stipula- 
tions for  the  protection  of  the  Armenians.  The  remnant 
of  the  race  out  of  whose  sufferings  so  much  political  capital 
had  been  made  during  the  war  to  arouse  hatred  of  the  Ger- 
mans and  the  Turks  was  without  compunction  left  once 
more  in  the  power  of  the  Turks. 

The  Greeks  were  forced  into  the  war,  after  their  first 
offer  of  aid  had  been  rejected,  because  of  the  military  neces- 
sities of  the  Entente  powers.^  After  the  armistices  the 
presence  of  the  Greek  armies  in  Macedonia  and  Thrace,  and 
their  occupation  of  Smyrna  at  the  invitation  of  the  Entente 
powers  during  the  peace  conference,  made  possible   the 

» See  pp.  300-301. 


PEACE  PREVENTED  BY  VICTORS  (1918-1922)      455 

acceptance  of  the  authority  of  the  victors  by  the  Bulgarians 
and  the  Turks.  Without  the  Greek  forces  to  call  upon,  the 
Entente  powers  would  hardly  have  dared  to  settle  in  Con- 
stantinople and  undertake  to  disarm  Bulgaria/  and  they 
could  not  have  expelled  the  Turks  from  Thrace.  They 
relied  upon  the  Greeks  to  furnish  the  bulk  of  the  forces 
used  to  attempt  to  intimidate  the  Turkish  nationalists,  who 
disregarded  the  terms  of  the  armistice.  The  Greeks  kept 
the  nationalists  occupied  while  the  French  were  getting 
their  hold  on  Syria  and  while  the  British  were  trying  to 
bring  Mesopotamia  and  the  Caucasus  under  their  adminis- 
trative control.  The  French  became  suspicious  of  the 
Greeks,  however,  and,  although  they  themselves  had  signed 
the  treaty  of  Sevres,  they  encouraged  the  Turks  to  resist 
the  Greeks.  The  Italians  went  farther  and  furnished  the 
Turks  with  arms  and  ammunition. 

Italy  was  determined  to  prevent  the  rise  of  a  powerful 
rival  in  the  eastern  Mediterranean.  The  ground  for  French 
suspicions  was  the  British  support  of  the  Greeks.  They 
feared  that  Greek  penetration  in  Asia  Minor  would  lead  to 
the  occupation  of  Constantinople,  which  the  Greeks  would 
hold  for  the  British.  The  French  attitude  towards  Greece 
in  1920  was  similar  to  the  British  attitude  towards  Bulgaria 
in  1878.  When  Venizelos  was  defeated  at  the  polls  and 
King  Constantine  returned  to  the  throne,  in  November, 
1920,  the  French  seized  this  event  as  a  pretext  for  open 
diplomatic  hostility  to  the  efforts  of  Greece  to  protect  Hel- 
lenism in  Asia  Minor.  When  the  British  realized  that  the 
Greeks  could  not  defeat  the  Kemalist  Turks,  they  cut  off 
their  subsidies  and  declared  that  Constantinople  and  the 
Straits  'should  be  neutral  in  the  war  between  the  Turkish 
nationalists  and  the  Greeks.  Six  months  later  the  British 
learned  that  the  French  were  dickering  with  Kemal  Pasha 

*  It  must  be  remembered  that  the  Eumanian  army,  scarcely  recovered 
from  its  demoralization,  had  to  face  the  Bolshevist  menace  in  Bessarabia, 
and  that  the  Serbians,  still  more  depleted  in  men  and  material,  were  strain- 
ing every  nerve  to  oppose  a  solid  front  against  the  Italians. 


456         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

at  Angora.  When  the  Franco-Kemalist  treaty  was  signed, 
the  British  denounced  French  bad  faith  and  began  to  sup- 
port the  Greeks  again. 

Following  close  upon  a  war  of  heroic  sacrifice  and  ideal- 
ism, these  facts  are  disagreeable  to  record.  But  it  is  not 
enough  to  realize  that  peace  did  not  come  as  a  result  of  the 
treaties,  and  to  connect  the  unsettled  condition  of  the  world 
with  the  agitation  of  dissatisfied  small  nations  and  subject 
peoples.  The  Turks  have  a  proverb  that  ''a  fish  begins  to 
corrupt  at  the  head."  If  the  principal  allied  and  associated 
powers  had  trusted  one  another,  and  had  been  willing  to 
cooperate  for  the  common  good,  they  could  have  imposed 
upon  the  world  the  reality  of  peace  as  easily  as  they  im- 
posed upon  Germany  a  signature  on  the  dotted  line. 
United,  none  could  have  withstood  them ;  divided,  they  have 
undermined  one  another's  authority  and  have  kept  the 
world  in  a  disturbed  economic  and  a  dangerous  political 
state  because  they  have  tried  to  push  one  another  aside  in 
the  mad  rush  for  the  fruits  of  victory. 


CHAPTER  XLI 

THE  EUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH 

(1917-1922) 

ON  March  12, 1917,  Czar  Nicholas  suspended  the  Duma. 
The  Lower  House  disregarded  the  ukase.  When  or- 
dered to  arrest  its  members,  the  Petrograd  garrison  muti- 
nied and  went  over  to  the  revolutionists.  Thereupon  the 
Duma  delegated  to  an  executive  committee  the  authority  to 
set  up  a  provisional  government.  The  next  day  the  prin- 
cipal reactionaries  and  most  of  the  czarist  ministers  and 
high  functionaries  were  imprisoned.  On  the  14th  Moscow, 
Odessa,  and  other  cities  declared  for  the  provisional  gov- 
ernment.   Czar  Nicholas  abdicated  on  the  15th. 

In  Entente  countries  the  Eussian  Revolution  was  inter- 
preted as  a  popular  movement,  sponsored  by  the  moderate 
political  leaders,  to  prevent  German  influence  at  the  Rus- 
sian court  from  gaining  the  ascendancy  to  the  extent  of 
causing  the  disruption  of  the  Entente  Alliance.  For  months 
rumors  of  a  separate  peace  had  circulated  in  neutral  coun- 
tries, and  had  caused  great  uneasiness  at  London,  Paris, 
and  Rome.  Now  it  was  predicted  not  only  that  Russia 
would  go  on  with  the  war,  but  that  the  disappearance  of 
czarism  would  mean  a  universal  awakening  of  enthusiasm 
for  the  war  against  German  absolutism.  Color  and  hope 
were  given  to  this  belief  by  the  declarations  of  the  provi- 
sional government.  New  Russia,  they  said,  was  naturally 
interested  in,  while  old  Russia  was  indifferent  to,  the  world- 
wide triumph  of  democracy.  The  speeches  of  President 
Wilson,  published  in  full  by  the  Russian  newspapers,  were 
regarded  as  the  gospel  of  a  new  era  in  international  re- 
lations. 

457 


458         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

The  revolution  had  deeper  roots  and  was  more  far-reach- 
ing in  its  influence  than  had  at  first  been  supposed.  The 
Duma  leaders  who  came  forward  to  assume  the  responsi- 
bilities of  government,  however,  seemed  to  be  as  blind  as 
were  the  Entente  diplomatic  representatives  to  the  fact  that 
war  weariness  was  the  reason  for  the  instantaneous  accept- 
ance of  the  revolution  by  the  armies  and  the  civilian  popu- 
lation. The  mass  of  the  Russian  people  had  no  antipathy 
to  the  Germans.  They  were  ignorant  of  the  imperialistic 
aspirations  that  the  Russian  government  hoped  to  reahze 
by  the  victory  of  the  Entente.  They  would  not  have  under- 
stood them  if  they  had  known.  For  nearly  three  years  the 
Russians  fought  against  their  enemies  without  a  conscious 
national  feeling  either  of  self-defense  or  of  self-aggrandize- 
ment. None  of  the  complex  of  motives  that  inspired  the 
British,  French,  and  Italians  had  stirred  and  spurred  and 
sustained  them.  Controlled  and  directed  by  the  machinery 
of  the  old  regime,  they  answered  the  call  to  arms,  and 
fought  well  if  well  led,  or  badly  if  badly  led.  When  the 
czarist  government  collapsed,  its  machinery  broke  down. 

Revolutionary  Russia  was  expected  by  the  Entente  states- 
men to  continue  to  function  as  czarist  Russia  had  func- 
tioned. The  first  provisional  government,  composed  of  dif- 
ferent elements  of  widely  varying  political  theories,  was 
unanimous  in  its  decision  to  continue  the  war;  but  a  split 
soon  occurred  over  the  question  of  the  objects  of  the  con- 
flict. Prince  Lvoff  and  Foreign  Minister  Miliukotf  were 
aggressive  and  impenitent  nationalists  who,  like  the  Young 
Turks,  believed  that  absolutism  could  be  destroyed  by  a 
popular  movement,  without  renouncing  the  spirit  and  poli- 
cies of  absolutism.  This  belief  led  them  to  assure  the 
Entente  ambassadors  that  the  understandings  and  the 
undertakings  of  the  alliance  would  be  preserved.  They 
were  willing  to  go  on  with  the  war  on  the  old  basis,  i.  e., 
that  each  should  contribute  to  the  common  cause  and  that 
each   should   receive   an   explicitly   defined   share   of   the 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    459 

booty.*  But  other  members  of  the  cabinet,  whose  spokes- 
man was  Kerensky,  declared  that  the  overthrow  of  the  czar 
meant  a  radical  departure  from  the  former  policies  of  Rus- 
sia. They  were  willing  to  urge  the  people  to  go  on  with 
the  war,  and  approved  the  recognition  of  the  independence 
of  Poland — a  measure  greatly  to  the  advantage  of  the 
Entente.  But  the  ideals  of  the  revolution  were  the  right 
of  peoples  to  decide  their  own  destinies  and  the  renuncia- 
tion of  intrigues  and  bargains  by  which  peoples  were  en- 
slaved. If  Russia  freed  Poland,  they  argued,  why  should 
not  Great  Britain  free  Ireland? 

The  clash  between  the  two  groups  came  over  the  question 
of  Constantinople.  Kerensky  told  representatives  of  the 
French  and  British  press  that  the  revolutionary  govern- 
ment had  no  interest  in  the  old  czarist  policy  of  conquests, 
which  was  contrary  to  the  spirit  of  the  revolution,  and 
therefore  waived  all  the  pledges  and  understandings  of  the 
secret  treaties.  He  specified  the  acquisition  of  Constanti- 
nople as  an  aspiration  that  revolutionary  Russia  no  longer 
sponsored.  Miliukoff  replied  that  Constantinople  was  as 
much  the  dream  of  new  Russia  as  of  old  Russia.  This 
brought  to  the  front  the  question  of  the  attitude  of  revolu- 
tionary Russia  towards  the  international  engagements  of 
the  fallen  regime.  The  socialists  were  strong  enough  to 
compel  Prince  Lvoff  to  issue  a  manifesto  stating  as  the 
policy  of  the  government  the  principle  of  ''no  annexation, 
no  indemnities,"  which  the  newly  formed  Soviets  of  work- 

*  The  liberal  and  radical  elements  in  Eussia  had  always  resented  the 
alliance  with  France.  Thoy  believed  that  France  had  loaned  money  to 
Eussia  neither  for  friendship's  sake  nor  for  investment,  but  solely  to 
create  a  military  and  naval  machine  with  which  to  menace  Germany  at  no 
expense  to  themselves.  Moreover,  the  exigencies  of  her  foreign  policy  had 
rendered  the  government  of  democratic  France  unsympathetic — even  hostile — 
to  the  liberal  movement  in  Eussia.  The  financial  and  political  support  of 
the  French  alliance  had,  in  fact,  enabled  the  absolutist  regime  to  remain 
in  control  of  the  destinies  of  Eussia.  When  the  war  broke  out,  Eussia  had 
been  promised  in  secret  treaties  her  share  of  the  spoils,  and  had  received  the 
definite  assurance  from  the  other  Entente  powers  that  they  would  not  interfere 
in  the  Polish  question.  In  1916,  and  again  in  the  early  part  of  1917, 
Prance  solicited  Eussia 's  support  for  France's  claim  to  a  Ehine  boundary, 
and  promised  in  return  to  aid  Eussia  in  suppressing  Polish  aspirations. 


460         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

men   and   soldiers   were   advocating.      The   government's 
declaration  of  April  9  read: 

*'The  government  deems  it  to  be  its  right  and  duty  to 
declare  now  that  free  Russia  does  not  aim  at  dominating 
other  nations,  at  depriving  them  of  their  national  patri- 
mony, or  at  occupying  by  force  foreign  territories;  but  that 
its  object  is  to  establish  a  durable  peace  on  the  basis  of 
the  rights  of  nations  to  decide  their  own  destiny.  The 
Russian  nation  does  not  lust  after  the  strengthening  of 
its  power  abroad  at  the  expense  of  other  nations.  Its  aim 
is  not  to  subjugate  or  to  humiliate  any  one." 

This  reversal  of  policy  gave  more  concern  to  Entente 
statesmen  than  did  the  loss  of  battles.  It  was  a  smashing 
blow  to  world-politics  diplomacy.  President  Wilson's 
speeches  were  regarded  as  harmless  babble,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  the  United  States  had  no  stake  in  the  secret 
agreements  made  before  and  during  the  war.  But  dealing 
with  Russia  on  the  basis  of  quid  pro  quo  had  been  the 
directing  principle  of  French  and  British  foreign  policy, 
and  had  made  possible  the  formation  of  the  Entente  Alli- 
ance. Closing  their  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  old  political 
structure  was  too  shattered  to  be  repaired,  and  that  the 
Russian  people  needed  a  new  and  radically  different  stimu- 
lus if  their  fighting  spirit  was  to  be  resuscitated,  the 
Entente  governments  insisted  that  Prince  Lvoff  and  Miliu- 
koff  continue  to  play  the  game  in  the  old  way.  At  the  end 
of  April  Miliukoff  sent  a  note  to  the  Allied  powers,  declar- 
ing that  new  Russia  was  in  complete  agreement  ''with  the 
well  known  war  aims  of  the  other  Entente  powers"  and 
that  ''the  nation's  determination  to  bring  the  World  War 
to  a  decisive  victory"  had  been  accentuated  by  the  revolu- 
tion. The  executive  committee  of  the  Council  of  Work- 
men's and  Soldiers'  Delegates  ordered  the  government  on 
May  4  to  send  a  new  note  to  the  Allied  powers,  contradict- 
ing that  of  I\Iiliukoff,  who  was  virtually  dismissed  as  a 
result  of  this  intervention  of  the  Soviets. 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    461 

Prince  Lvoff  formed  a  coalition  government,  in  which 
Kerensky  was  shifted  from  the  ministry  of  justice  to  that 
of  war  and  marine  combined.  The  new  ministry  notified 
the  powers  that  '4n  its  foreign  policy  the  provisional  gov- 
ernment, rejecting,  in  concert  with  the  entire  people,  all 
thought  of  a  separate  peace,  adopts  openly  as  its  aim  the 
reestablishment  of  a  general  peace,  which  shall  not  tend 
towards  either  domination  over  other  nations,  or  the  seizure 
of  their  national  possessions,  or  the  violent  usurpation  of 
their  territories — a  peace  without  annexation  or  indemni- 
ties, and  based  upon  the  rights  of  nations  to  decide  their 
own  affairs."  There  was  urgent  need  for  a  reply  that 
would  conciliate  the  radical  elements,  which  by  this  time 
were  acknowledged  to  have  the  real  power  in  Russia.  For 
a  tacit  armistice  had  already  been  entered  into  by  the  com- 
mon soldiers  on  the  front,  and  the  morale  of  the  army  was 
breaking  down.  At  the  end  of  May  an  earnest  appeal  was 
made  by  the  Soviets  to  the  Alhed  governments  to  give  a 
definite  answer  to  the  formula  of  ''no  annexations,  no 
indemnities. '  * 

On  June  12  the  British  and  French  governments  made 
public  their  answer  to  the  Russian  manifesto  of  April  9. 
Great  Britain  had  replied  directly,  stating  that  the  pur- 
pose of  the  United  Kingdom  ''at  the  outset"  was  to  defend 
its  existence  "and  to  enforce  respect  for  international  ar- 
rangements. To  these  objects  has  now  been  added  that  of 
liberating  populations  oppressed  by  alien  tyranny."  The 
British  government  was  in  agreement  with  the  Russian 
declaration  of  not  dominating  "other  peoples  or  taking 
from  them  their  national  patrimony  or  forcibly  occupying 
foreign  territory."  Heartily  accepting  and  approving  the 
"principles  laid  down  by  President  Wilson  in  his  message 
to  Congress,"  the  British  government  believed  "that, 
broadly  speaking,  the  agreements  which  they  have  from 
time  to  time  made  with  their  allies  are  conformable  to 
these  standards.    But  if  the  Russian  government  so  de- 


462         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

sires,  they  are  quite  ready  with  their  allies  to  examine  and, 
if  need  be,  to  revise  these  agreements."  The  French,  in 
more  general  terms,  sympathized  with  the  Russian  prin- 
ciples, which  were  their  own,  but  deftly  evaded  any  promise 
to  accept  "no  annexations,  no  indemnities,"  even  if  the 
restoration  of  Alsace-Lorraine  and  the  compensation  for 
physical  damages  resulting  to  France  from  the  German 
invasion  were  excepted. 

When  a  final  offensive  at  the  beginning  of  July  ended  in 
defeat,  the  Russian  army  disappeared  as  a  factor  in  the 
war.  Kerensky  became  premier  on  July  16,  and  tried  in 
vain  to  induce  the  Allied  powers  to  realize  the  consequences 
of  a  refusal  to  agree  to  a  definite  revision  of  the  secret 
treaties  along  the  lines  of  President  Wilson's  principles. 
Had  not  the  United  States  intervened  shortly  after  the 
Russian  Revolution  and  shown  amazing  zeal  and  efficiency 
in  contributing  money  and  men  to  the  Allied  cause,  it  is 
probable  that  Kerensky  would  have  met  with  some  meas- 
ure of  success  in  his  negotiations.  But  the  Entente  states- 
men deliberately  weighed  the  advantages  and  disadvan- 
tages of  a  compromise  with  revolutionary  Russia.  On  the 
one  side,  a  partial  renunciation  of  imperialism  might  keep 
Russia  in  the  war;  on  the  other,  there  was  no  telling  how 
far  the  Russians  would  force  them  to  go  in  waiving  the 
possible  gains  of  victory,  or  whether  Kerensky  or  any  other 
leader  could  be  counted  upon  to  whip  into  shape  once  more 
the  Russian  armies.  Now  that  the  United  States  was  in 
the  war,  ultimate  victory  seemed  assured,  no  matter  what 
happened  in  Russia. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  revolution  the  socialists  were  in 
favor  of  continuing  the  war.  The  entry  of  the  United 
States,  under  the  aegis  of  the  Wilsonian  principles,  had 
made  them  feel  that  an  Allied  victory  over  Germany  would 
establish  a  new  world  order.  Delegations  from  Great 
Britain  and  France  and  Italy  of  cabinet  ministers  and  par- 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    463 

liamentarians  of  their  own  political  creed  assured  them 
that  there  was  an  increasingly  powerful  sentiment  growing 
up  in  Allied  countries  for  a  durable  peace  based  upon  a 
renunciation  of  imperialism.  But  as  the  months  dragged 
on  and  they  saw  that  the  Allied  governments  had  no  inten- 
tion of  defining  their  war  aims  and  pledging  themselves  to 
the  principle  of  "no  annexations,  no  indemnities,"  even 
with  modifications,  they  lost  interest  in  sustaining  or  re- 
creating a  war  spirit  among  the  people,  and  either  made 
no  further  effort  to  retain  their  leadership  or  joined  the 
extremists. 

Much  has  been  written  about  various  causes  of  the  col- 
lapse of  the  Kerensky  government.  Kerensky  is  blamed 
for  his  impracticable  theories  and  his  lack  of  firmness  in 
dealing  with  the  growing  power  of  the  Bolshevists.  But 
the  fundamental  factor  in  undermining  his  influence  and 
paving  the  way  for  the  Bolshevist  regime  was  the  refusal 
of  the  other  Entente  powers  to  give  the  Russians,  who 
were  loyal  to  the  Entente  and  who  wanted  to  continue  the 
war,  the  assurance  that  the  Entente  coalition  was  ready  to 
make  peace — if  Germany  was — on  the  basis  of  cooperation 
in  establishing  a  new  world  order.  The  majority  socialists 
were  in  sympathy  with  the  program  of  freeing  alien  peo- 
ples from  Hohenzollern,  Hapsburg,  and  Ottoman  domina- 
tion, and  they  had  proved  the  genuineness  of  this  sympathy 
by  consenting  to  the  independence  of  the  peoples  similarly 
held  under  Romanoff  domination.  Believing  that  changes 
of  sovereignty  should  be  made  with  the  interests  of  the 
peoples  concerned  in  view,  and  not  under  the  influence  of 
promoting  the  interests  of  the  victorious  powers,  they 
called  upon  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  to  abandon 
the  definite  rewards  and  arrangements  of  the  secret 
treaties,  as  Russia  was  willing  to  do,  and  to  adopt  in  place 
of  them  a  policy  of  disinterestedness.  They  argued  that 
the  central  empires  would  then  have  to  accept  peace  on  that 


464         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

basis  or  be  put  unmistakably  in  the  position  of  defenders 
and  upholders  of  the  principles  that  the  Russian  Revolution 
was  combating.^ 

During  the  autumn  of  1917  the  war  became  so  unpopular 
that  the  loyalty  to  the  Entente  of  the  Kerensky  cabinet 
made  inevitable  its  downfall.  Food  was  scarce  in  the  cities, 
and  the  peasant  masses,  agitated  by  the  stories  of  cruelty 
and  hardship  brought  back  by  deserting  soldiers,  encour- 
aged disobedience  of  the  orders  to  return,  and  began  to 
threaten  to  starve  out  those  in  the  cities  who  were  opposed 
to  ending  the  war.  Moreover,  their  chief  interest — and 
this  the  soldiers  shared — had  become  the  expropriation  and 
further  division  of  the  land.  The  Bolshevists  had  secured 
control  of  the  Petrograd  and  Moscow  Soviets  and  those 
of  other  large  towns.  By  a  coup  d'etat  on  November  7 
they  overthrew  the  Kerensky  government.  The  next  day 
Lenin  formed  a  new  revolutionary  committee  to  govern 
Russia  under  the  name  of  'Hhe  commissaries  of  the 
people. ' ' 

Trotzky,  president  of  the  Petrograd  soviet,  became 
"commissary  of  the  people  for  foreign  affairs,"  and  cele- 
brated his  advent  to  power  by  publishing  secret  treaties 
entered  into  by  Russia  and  several  of  the  other  Allied 
powers.  These  were  followed  by  the  serial  publication  in 
a  Petrograd  newspaper  of  the  correspondence  of  the  Rus- 
sian ambassadors  with  the  ministry  of  foreign  affairs  and 

*  More  than  a  year  later,  on  September  27,  1918,  President  Wilson  summed 
up  and  indorsed  the  attitude  of  the  Russian  socialists  when  he  said :  * '  As- 
semblies and  associations  of  many  kinds  made  up  of  plain  workaday  people 
have  demanded,  .  .  .  and  are  still  demanding,  that  the  leaders  of  their  gov- 
ernments declare  to  them  plainly  what  it  is,  exactly  what  it  is,  that  they 
are  seeking  m  this  war,  and  what  they  think  the  items  of  their  final  settlement 
should  be.  They  are  not  yet  satisfied  with  what  they  have  been  told.  They 
still  seem  to  fear  that  they  are  getting  what  they  ask  for  only  in  statesmen's 
terms — only  in  the  terms  of  territorial  arrangements  and  discussions  of  power, 
and  not  in  terms  of  broad-visioned  justice  and  mercy  and  peace  and  the 
satisfaction  of  these  deep-seated  longings  of  oppressed  and  distracted  men 
and  women  and  enslaved  peoples  that  seem  to  them  the  only  things  worth 
fighting  a  war  for  that  engulfs  the  world." 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    465 

of  confidential  communications  among  the  Entente  powers. 
The  authenticity  of  these  documents  was  not  denied. 
They  revealed  what  had  long  been  suspected  but  could 
not  be  proved,  i.  e.,  the  existence  of  concrete  war  aims  at 
variance  with  the  idealistic  professions  of  the  Entente 
statesmen. 

The  Bolshevists  declared  an  armistice,  entered  into  nego- 
tiations with  the  central  empires  at  Brest-Litovsk,  and, 
yielding  to  the  pressure  of  German  invasion,  signed  on 
March  3,  1918,  a  treaty  with  Germany,  Austria-Hungary, 
Bulgaria,  and  Turkey,  upon  the  following  terms:  (1) 
renunciation  of  sovereignty  over  Finland,  the  Baltic  prov- 
inces, Lithuania,  Poland,  and  the  Ukraine,  and  evacu- 
ation of  these  territories;  (2)  promise  to  secure  for  Tur- 
key the  due  return  of  her  eastern  Anatolian  frontiers  and 
the  recognition  of  the  annulment  of  the  Turkish  capitula- 
tions; (3)  evacuation  of  the  trans-Caucasian  provinces; 
(4)  internment  of  Russian  and  Entente  war-ships  in  the 
Black  Sea,  Baltic  Sea,  and  Arctic  Ocean  until  the  conclu- 
sion of  a  general  peace;  (5)  complete  demobilization  of  the 
Russian  army.  It  was  agreed  that  Germany  and  Austria- 
Hungary  were  to  arrange  the  status  of  the  liberated  ter- 
ritories on  the  western  frontiers,  in  consultation  with  the 
inhabitants,  and  that  Turkey  should  enjoy  a  similar  respon- 
sibility in  the  districts  of  Ardahan,  Kars,  and  Batum.  The 
Ukraine,  having  signed  a  separate  treaty  with  the  central 
powers  coalition,  was  recognized  by  Russia  as  an  inde- 
pendent state.  Lenin  and  Trotzky  declared  that  the  gov- 
ernment was  compelled  to  conclude  peace  on  the  terms  dic- 
tated by  German  imperialism,  but  that  the  Russian  people 
could  look  forward  confidently  to  a  later  general  peace, 
concluded  on  equal  terms  with  all  people  after  the  other 
nations,  like  Russia,  had  rid  themselves  of  their  capitalist 
governments.  Trotzky  changed  his  portfolio  to  that  of 
military  and  naval  affairs,  and  was  succeeded  in  the  con- 


466         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

duct  of  foreign  affairs  by  Tchitcherin.  Up  to  the  present 
writing  ^  these  three  men  had  remained  in  control  of  Rus- 
sian destinies. 

The  collapse  of  the  central  empires  and  Turkey  de- 
stroyed the  treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk,  whose  terms  were 
denounced  by  Germany,  Austria-Hungary,  and  Turkey  in 
the  treaties  of  Versailles,  St.  Germain,  Trianon,  and 
Sevres.  By  later  treaties,  concluded  directly  with  the  peo- 
ples concerned,  the  soviet  government  recognized  the  inde- 
pendence, and  agreed  upon  the  new  frontiers,  of  Finland, 
Esthonia,  Latvia,  and  Poland.  Through  the  post-armistice 
military  intervention  of  Great  Britain  and  France,  govern- 
ments independent  of  Moscow,  Berlin,  and  Constantinople 
were  set  up  in  the  Ukraine,  Baku  (called  the  Azerbaidjan 
Republic),  Georgia,  and  Armenia,  and  were  given  de  facto 
recognition.  But  while  the  four  Baltic  Sea  republics  and 
Poland  had  been  able,  through  their  own  efforts  and  some 
aid  from  the  Entente,  to  preserve  their  independence,  repel 
Bolshevist  invasions,  and  secure  frontiers  more  favorable 
than  those  accorded  them  by  the  treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk, 
the  Ukraine  and  the  republics  of  the  Caucasus  succumbed 
to  Bolshevist  propaganda.  Before  the  end  of  1921  these 
states  had  adopted  the  soviet  form  of  government  and  were 
closely  alHed  with  Moscow. 

After  the  defection  of  Russia  the  Entente  powers  re- 
fused to  recognize  the  soviet  government  on  the  ground 
that  it  did  not  express  the  will  of  the  people.  Therefore 
they  declared  that  they  were  justified  in  intervening  with 
military  forces  to  carry  on  their  war  against  Germany  on 
Russian  soil.  The  armistices  were  signed,  yet  the  Entente 
powers,  including  the  United  States,  did  not  withdraw 
their  troops  from  Russia.  On  the  contrary,  they  adopted 
the  attitude  that  the  soviet  government  was  the  enemy  of 
mankind,  and  they  did  all  in  their  power  to  aid  counter- 
revolutionary movements.    In  addition,  the  blockade  meas- 

» May,  1922. 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    467 

ures,  which  had  proved  so  effective  against  Germany  and 
which  had  been  extended  to  Eussia  without  a  declaration  of 
war,  were  maintained.  Successively,  however,  during  1919 
and  1920,  the  Bolshevist  armies  defeated  General  Denikin, 
Admiral  Kolchak,  General  Yudenitch,  and  Baron  Wrangel, 
who  had  behind  them  Entente  diplomatic  and  military  sup- 
port,^ and  the  Ukrainian  General  Petlura,  who  was  backed 
by  Poland. 

The  history  of  the  French  Revolution  repeated  itself. 
Every  effort  of  counter-revolutionary  armies,  working  for 
the  restoration  of  the  monarchy  and  receiving  aid  from 
foreign  powers,  not  only  met  with  disaster,  but  also 
strengthened  the  hold  on  the  people,  which  was  slight  at 
first,  of  the  regime  that  the  world  had  determined  to  de- 
stroy. "When  foreign  troops  invaded  Russia  at  Archangel, 
at  Vladivostok,  and  at  Odessa,  national  feeling  ran  high. 
When  the  British  simply  replaced  the  Turks  and  the  Ger- 
mans in  the  Caucasus  and  revealed  the  fact  that  they  were 
aiming  at  the  oil-wells  of  Baku,  the  bulk  of  the  more  intelli- 
gent Russians  still  alive  in  their  own  country  rallied  to 
Lenin,  though  they  loathed  him.  WTien  France  armed  and 
trained  the  Poles  and  incited  them  to  attack  Russia,  and 
when  the  Russians  realized  that  the  French  diplomatic  and 
military  agents  in  Czecho-Slovakia  and  Rumania  were  try- 
ing to  induce  these  states  to  join  Poland,  from  general  to 
private  the  Russians  who  truly  loved  their  country  offered 
their  swords  to  Lenin. 

The  Russian  Revolution,  culminating  in  a  separate  peace 
with  Germany  and  in  the  establishment  of  a  communist 

*  British,  French,  and  Greek  military  missions  and  troops  were  with  Denikin ; 
Kolchak  had  Czecho-Slovak  and  Japanese  aid,  and  Americans  guarding  his 
lines  of  communication;  a  British  military  mission  in  Esthonia  and  the  com- 
bined Allied  forces  at  Archangel  inspired  Yudenitch 's  march  on  Petrograd; 
and  Baron  Wrangel  was  actually  recognized  by  the  French  government.  All 
these  attempts  to  overthrow  Lenin  were  made  possible  by  Entente  supplies, 
and  even  the  Red  Cross  abandoned  its  neutrality  to  further  the  anti-Bolshevist 
propaganda  by  giving  medicines,  food,  and  clothing  to  the  Russians  who  wel- 
comed these  adventures  and  withholding  its  ministrations  from  the  regions 
that  did  not  join  the  anti-Bolshevist  armies. 


468         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

government  of  remarkable  energy  and  stability,^  has  influ- 
enced world  politics  in  a  way  that  the  defeat  of  Germany 
did  not  do  and  that  the  victory  of  Germany  would  not  have 
done.  For,  despite  her  success  in  penetrating  the  Ottoman 
Empire  and  her  Shantung  venture,  Germany  was  not  a 
factor  of  prime  importance  either  in  the  Near  East  or  in 
the  Far  East.  Had  she  won  the  war  she  would  still  not 
have  had  control  of  the  sea,  and  she  was  not  in  territory 
contiguous  to  the  Ottoman  Empire  and  China.  Losing  the 
war,  Germany  withdrew  from  world  politics  without  radi- 
cally affecting  the  struggle  of  the  more  fortunate  European 
powers,  Japan,  and  the  United  States  for  world  power 
and  world  markets.  Russia,  on  the  other  hand,  had  been 
an  integral  factor  in  the  development  of  the  Near  Eastern 
and  Far  Eastern  questions.  She  had  affected  the  evolution 
of  British  colonial  policy,  directly  in  the  protection  of  India 
and  indirectly  in  the  arrangement  of  spheres  of  influence 
in  Africa.  As  we  have  seen,  the  alliance  that  the  Germans 
believed  was  encircling  them  in  Europe  and  excluding  them 
from  markets  outside  Europe  had  been  possible  because 
Russia  was  a  colonial  power,  imbued  with  the  same  impe- 
rialistic ambitions  as  France  and  Great  Britain,  and  was 
able  to  bargain  with  the  other  two  colonial  powers,  while 
Germany  had  to  shake  her  saber  to  make  her  voice  heard.- 
The  geographical  position  of  Russia  gave  her  the  key  posi- 
tion in  world  politics.  She  was  neighbor  to  the  central 
empires  and  the  Balkan  States  in  Europe,  and  to  the  Otto- 
man Empire,  Persia,  Afghanistan,  China,  and  Japan  in 
Asia. 

The  withdrawal  of  Russia  from  the  World  War  by  the 

*  The  writer  wishes  to  remind  his  readers  that  the  limitation  of  the  scope 
of  his  subject  to  the  phases  affecting  international  relations  makes  impossible 
and  irrelevant  mention  of  many  other  aspects  of  the  situations  with  which  his 
chapters  deal.  In  order  that  there  may  be  no  misunderstanding,  he  wishes 
it  to  be  understood  that  the  statement  of  facts  does  not  necessarily  mean  that 
he  is  glad  that  they  are  facts!  The  writer  has  no  sympathy  with  the  methods 
of  Bolshevism,  and  no  faith  in  its  economic  theories. 

*See  Chapters  XIV  and  XV. 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    469 

treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk  came  too  late  to  give  the  victory 
to  Germany.  But  this  defection  from  the  Entente  alliance, 
coupled  with  the  defection  of  Rumania  two  days  later,^ 
would  have  enabled  Germany  and  her  allies  to  conclude  an 
advantageous  peace,  had  not  the  United  States  demon- 
strated her  ability  to  place  in  France  an  army  of  unlimited 
strength  and  excellent  fighting  quality  despite  the  subma- 
rine blockade.  The  United  States,  however,  did  not  and 
could  not  take  the  place  of  Russia  in  the  combinations  of 
European  diplomacy,  in  reference  either  to  the  balance  of 
power  in  Europe  or  to  the  maintenance  of  the  doctrine  of 
European  eminent  domain  in  Asia.  By  denouncing  the  pre- 
war arrangements,  on  which  Great  Britain  relied  for  her 
security  in  Asia  and  France  for  her  security  in  Europe, 
and  by  renouncing  the  privileges  accorded  Russia  for 
further  expansion  in  the  secret  treaties  concluded  during 
the  war,  Lenin  and  his  associates  not  only  robbed  the 
Entente  powers  of  the  fruits  of  victory  so  exactly  provided 
for  by  their  statesmen,  but  also  challenged  the  status  quo 
ante  helium  in  Asia. 

The  fear  of  the  spread  of  Bolshevism  to  the  rest  of 
Europe  and  to  the  United  States  had  little  to  do  with  the 
bitter  opposition  of  the  French  and  British  governments  to 
the  soviet  regime.  Political,  economic,  and  social  condi- 
tions in  central  and  western  Europe  and  America  do  not 
furnish  fruitful  ground  for  communist  propaganda. 
Entente  statesmen  knew  this,  but  they  played  up  the  Bol- 
shevist nightmare  during  the  peace  conference  and  after- 
wards in  the  effort  to  destroy  the  soviet  government  before 
its  influence  might  extend  throughout  Asia  and  into  Africa, 
imperiling  the  hold  of  the  colonial  powers  upon  their  sub- 
ject races.  This  is  a  strong  statement,  but  many  signifi- 
cant facts  can  be  adduced  to  support  it.  The  defeated 
countries  did  not  adopt  Bolshevism  as  the  alternative  to 

^  The   preliminary   treaty  between   Bumania   and   the   central    empires  was 
signed  on  March  5,  1918. 


470         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

signing  drastic  treaties.  Italy,  who  had  no  colonial  in- 
terests of  importance  to  consider,  was  the  least  alarmed  of 
the  Entente  powers,  although  she  was  more  seriously 
threatened  by  communist  propaganda  than  any  other  coun- 
try in  Europe.  When  Great  Britain  realized  that  Lenin 
could  not  be  overthrown,  her  government  and  her  courts 
recognized  the  new  regime  as  the  de  facto  government, 
exacting  not  the  repudiation  of  the  political  theories  and 
practices  against  which  the  crusade  had  been  declared,  but 
the  cessation  of  propaganda  in  India  and  the  countries  that 
formed  the  shields  to  India.  The  military  intervention  of 
Japan  was  aimed  at  preventing  Bolshevist  propaganda 
from  reaching  China  and  Korea  as  much  as  at  inheriting 
Muscovite  influence  in  Mongolia  and  Manchuria  and  con- 
trolling the  future  of  Siberia  east  of  Lake  Baikal.  The 
Entente  powers  did  not  intend  that  the  destruction  of  Ger- 
man and  Russian  autocracy  should  be  followed  by  a  world- 
wide political  and  colonial  readjustment  in  which  the  same 
principles  would  be  applied  to  the  territories  and  depen- 
dencies of  all  nations. 

The  opportunism  and  lack  of  guiding  principles  in  world 
politics  are  demonstrated  by  the  capital  the  Entente 
powers  endeavored  to  make  out  of  the  misfortunes  of 
Russia  after  the  victory  over  Germany  was  assured.  If 
Allied  statesmen  believed  that  the  great  mass  of  the  Russian 
people  was  opposed  to  Bolshevism,  and  was  being  terror- 
ized by  a  gang  of  ruffians  subsidized  by  Germany,  the  rigor- 
ous blockade  of  more  than  a  hundred  million  human  beings, 
our  allies,  was  inexplicable.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  they 
believed  that  Russia  was  so  contaminated  with  Bolshevism 
that  a  cordon  smiitaire  was  necessary,  continued  military 
intervention  after  Germany  had  sued  for  peace  was  an 
act  of  war  against  a  great  nation,  based  upon  our  condem- 
nation of  that  nation's  management  of  its  internal  affairs. 
V  V  I  President  Wilson  tried  to  put  an  end  to  this  anomalous 
.   .>3o    ^     I  situation  by  proposing  the  Prinkipo  conference  in  Febru- 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    471 

ary,  1919.  The  suggestion  was  howled  down,  but  nothing 
constructive  was  adopted  in  its  place.  At  that  time  Entente 
statesmen  might  have  been  justified  in  holding  that  the 
Bolshevists  were  usurpers;  they  were  not  justified  in  re- 
fusing to  look  upon  the  civil  war  in  Russia  from  the  point 
of  view  of  helping  the  Russian  people  to  their  feet.  There 
was  no  sympathy  for  a  great  people  in  the  throes  of  politi- 
cal and  social  evolution.  Occidental  Europe  and  America 
did  not  want  to  admit  the  right  of  the  Russians  to  work 
out  their  own  salvation  without  interference;  nor  did  we 
give  the  anti-Bolshevists  the  right  to  speak  for  Russia  at 
the  Paris  conference,  nor  assure  them  that  we  should  make 
no  decision  affecting  Russian  territories  and  interests  with- 
out their  participation  and  consent. 

The  occasion  was  considered  propitious  for  carrying  out 
policies  that  would  have  been  modified  or  blocked  by  what- 
ever delegates  the  Entente  governments  might  have  been 
willing  to  regard  as  representing  genuine  Russian  senti- 
ments and  the  interests  of  the  Russian  people.  At  the 
peace  conference  Russians  would  have  insisted  upon  a 
drastic  modification  of  Italy's  gains  in  return  for  giving 
up  Constantinople ;  they  would  have  contested  the  right  of 
Great  Britain  to  speak  for  Persia,  to  erect  the  Azerbaidjan 
Republic,  and  to  give  Palestine  as  a  home-land  to  the  Jews ; 
and  they  would  have  protested  vehemently  against  the 
policies  of  France  in  Poland  and  the  other  successor  states, 
and  of  Japan  in  Siberia,  Mongolia,  and  Manchuria.  The 
strongest  argument  Lenin  was  able  to  make  in  bidding  for 
united  Russian  support,  aside  from  the  obvious  one  of 
foreign  invasion,  was  when  he  pointed  out  in  speeches  and 
manifestos  that  the  ''capitalist  countries"  were  not  hold- 
ing Russian  imperial  interests  in  sacred  trust  for  the  * '  capi- 
talist Russia"  they  professed  their  eagerness  to  reestab- 
lish. If  the  Entente  powers  and  the  United  States  were 
sincere  in  their  friendship  for  the  Russian  people,  as  Amer- 
ican Secretary  of   State  Colby  asserted  in  his  note  of 


472         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

August  20,  1919,  why  did  they  agree  to  the  annexation  of 
Bessarabia  to  Eumania,  encourage  Polish  imperialism, 
attempt  to  alienate  the  Caucasus,  allow  Japan  to  stay  in 
Siberia,  and  make  a  division  of  the  spoils  of  the  war  in  the 
Near  East  and  elsewhere  without  reserving  any  part  for 
Eussia  when  she  should  ''return  to  her  senses"? 

Soviet  Russia  during  1921  radically  modified  its  com- 
munist theories  of  government  and  abandoned  its  revolu- 
tionary propaganda  in  Europe  and  America.  The  blockade 
and  the  impracticability  of  the  soviet  theories  combined  to 
bring  the  country  to  economic  ruin  and  to  famine.  The 
renewal  of  trade  with  the  outside  world  was  essential,  and 
food-stuffs  had  to  be  solicited  from  America  to  save 
millions  from  starvation.  Gradually  Russia  is  returning  of 
her  own  accord  into  the  family  of  "capitalistic  nations." 
But  Moscow  has  not  abandoned  the  intention  of  allowing 
all  the  former  subject  races  of  the  Russian  Empire  to  work 
out  their  own  destinies  in  their  own  way.  This  in  itself 
is  a  danger  to  European  overlordship  in  Asia  and  in  the 
Mohammedan  countries  of  Africa,  however  much  Lenin 
may  find  it  to  the  interest  of  his  country  to  abide  loyally 
by  the  trade  agreement  entered  into  with  Great  Britain, 
and  prevent  Russia  from  being  used  as  the  base  of  self- 
determination  propaganda. 

Unless  Russia  again  becomes  reactionary  and  imbued 
with  the  spirit  of  imperialism,  however,  the  mischief  in  the 
Near  East,  the  Middle  East,  and  the  Far  East  can  not  be 
repaired.  Soviet  Russia  has  renounced  the  capitulations 
in  Turkey,  the  Anglo-Persian  agreement  of  1907,  and  her 
concessions  and  leaseholds  in  Persia  and  China.  She  has 
canceled  the  Persian  debt  and  the  Boxer  indemnity,  and 
has  concluded  treaties  with  Persia,  Afghanistan,  and  her 
former  Moslem  subjects  of  central  Asia  on  the  basis  of 
equality.  This  gives  no  further  excuse  for  Great  Britain 
to  interfere  in  the  internal  affairs  of  Persia  and  Afghanis- 
tan, and  sets  an  embarrassing  example  of  international 


RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  AFTERMATH    473 

morality  for  the  other  European  powers  to  follow.     In 

China  especially,  the  Russian  Revolution,  despite  what  was 

accomplished  at  Washington,  has  confronted  Europe  and 

the  United  States  with  the  choice  of  allowing  Japan  to  be-  j 

come  the  dominant  power  in  the  Far  East  or  renouncing '  ^^  l^ 

particular  interests  for  the  common  good  of  all  nations. 


CHAPTER  XLII 

OVERSEAS  POSSESSIONS  OF  " SECOND AEY  STATES" 
(1815-1922) 

ASIDE  from  the  five  principal  allied  and  associated 
powers,  two  other  belligerents,  Portugal  and  Bel- 
gium, and  three  neutrals,  Spain,  Denmark,  and  Holland, 
had  title  to  overseas  possessions  after  the  peace  conference 
completed  its  work. 

The  Portuguese  footholds  in  Asia  are  insignificant:  on 
the  west  coast  of  India  the  enclaves  of  Goa  and  Damao ;  in 
the  Arabian  Sea  the  little  island  of  Dio ;  in  the  Malay  Archi- 
pelago the  eastern  portion  of  Timor  with  a  strip  called 
Ambeno  on  the  neighboring  island  of  Pulo  Cambing;  and 
the  island  of  Macao  at  the  mouth  of  the  Canton  River  in 
China.  The  Portuguese  colonial  possessions  in  Africa, 
however,  are  important  not  only  because  of  their  size  and 
potential  wealth,  but  also  because  of  their  geographical  dis- 
tribution. The  Madeira  and  Azores  Islands  are  considered 
an  integral  part  of  Portugal.  The  colonies  are :  the  Cape 
Verde  Islands,  Guinea,  Sao  Thome  and  Principe,  Angola, 
and  Portuguese  East  Africa.  They  cover  nearly  eight  hun- 
dred thousand  square  miles,  and  have  a  population  of  more 
than  eight  millions. 

The  fourteen  islands  of  the  Cape  Verde  group  are  on  the 
route  from  Europe  to  South  America  and  command  the 
coastal  passage  around  Africa.  The  cables  to  Brazil  and 
to  South  Africa,  and  also  the  line  to  British  Gambia,  touch 
at  St.  Vincent.  Guinea  is  an  enclave  in  French  West 
Africa.  Sao  Thome  and  Principe  are  advantageously  lo- 
cated in  the  Gulf  of  Guinea.  Angola  extends  from  the 
mouth  of  the  Congo  south  to  former  German  Southwest 

474 


SECONDARY  STATES'  OVERSEAS  POSSESSIONS    475 

Africa.  Portuguese  East  Africa  occupies  the  east  coast 
from  Cape  Delgado,  the  boundary  with  former  German 
East  Africa,  south  to  Delagoa  Bay,  which  cuts  off  the 
Transvaal  from  the  sea,  and  lies  just  north  of  Natal.  Por- 
tugal has  not  been  able  to  keep  pace  with  the  other  colonial 
powers  in  the  development  of  either  Asiatic  or  African 
colonies,  and,  as  she  is  not  a  maritime  power,  they  have  no 
strategic  value  to  her.  She  has  retained  her  colonies  only 
because  for  the  past  two  hundred  years  she  has  never  been 
in  antagonism  with  British  policy  nor  allied  to  one  of 
Britain's  enemies. 

Before  the  World  War  the  Portuguese  colonies  loomed 
large  in  world  politics,  because  Great  Britain  and  France, 
especially  the  former,  feared  that  Germany  planned  to 
annex  them,  either  by  seizure  or  by  purchase.  Angola  and 
East  Africa  became  neighbors  of  Germany  bet"\veen  1884 
and  1889,  and  it  was  feared  that  some  pretext  would  be 
invented  to  seize  them  when  Great  Britain  w^as  fighting  the 
Boers.  What  worried  the  British  most  was  the  thought  of 
having  Germany  in  possession  of  islands  on  the  trade 
routes.  Consequently,  at  the  beginning  of  the  Boer  War 
the  British  government  sounded  Germany  as  to  her  inten- 
tions and  indicated  its  willingness  to  agree  upon  an  even- 
tual division  of  the  Portuguese  colonies,  should  Portugal 
at  any  time  feel  the  necessity  of  disposing  of  them.  These 
pourparlers  were  resumed  in  1913,  and  the  British  were 
willing  to  consent  to  the  continental  expansion  of  Germany 
in  Africa,  provided  they  could  acquire  the  islands.  The 
war  put  an  end  to  the  plan  of  joint  purchase.  Portugal 
retains  all  her  colonies,  but,  as  Great  Britain  and  France 
have  more  of  Africa  than  they  can  develop  and  there  are 
no  other  bidders,  the  Portuguese  colonies  have  no  present 
international  market  value  or  importance. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  the  convention 
of  1890  between  Belgium  and  the  Congo  Free  State  was 
about  to  expire.    The  question  of  annexation  was  raised  in 


476         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Belgium,  and  in  the  rest  of  the  world  the  question  of  the 
fitness  of  the  Belgians  to  be  the  stewards  of  so  large  and 
important  a  part  of  the  African  continent.  Livingstone's 
dream  of  central  Africa  for  Christ  had  been  superseded  by 
the  actuality  of  central  Africa  for  rubber,  and  European 
penetration  of  the  Dark  Continent,  far  from  bringing  civ- 
ilization and  happiness  to  the  natives,  had  left  them  in 
barbarism  and  brought  them  misery.  In  1902  the  British 
Foreign  Office  intimated  to  the  powers  that  had  signed  the 
Berlin  act  that  it  might  be  advisable  to  put  an  end  to  the 
maladministration  of  the  Congo  Free  State.^  Failing  to 
secure  agreement  among  the  powers,  the  British  govern- 
ment in  1903  independently  made  strong  diplomatic  repre- 
sentations at  Brussels.  Belgium  was  told  that  this  action 
was  prompted,  not  by  tales  of  travelers  and  missionaries, 
but  by  reports  of  British  consuls,  one  corroborating  the 
other  in  such  a  fashion  that  the  evidence  could  not  be  con- 
troverted.^ The  Belgian  public  took  this  move  in  bad  part. 
It  was  felt  that  Great  Britain's  motive  in  protesting  against 
the  conditions  in  the  Congo  was  the  desire  to  appropriate 
the  fruit  of  the  work  that  had  converted  the  Congo  into 
a  rich  domain  and  to  link  up  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan 
with  the  British  possessions  in  south-central  Africa  for 
the  purpose  of  realizing  the  Cape-to-Cairo  all-British 
railway. 

On  December  4,  1907,  the  Belgian  government  presented 
to  the  Chamber  a  treaty  between  King  Leopold  and  Bel- 
gium. The  Congo  Free  State  was  purchased  by  Belgium 
from  the  king,  but  the  government  refused  to  be  respon- 

^  The  writer  regrets  that  he  is  unable  to  give  the  necessary  space  in  this 
volume  to  a  statement  of  the  various  international  conferences  and  agree- 
ments concerning  Africa.     See  Herslett,  "The  Map  of  Africa  by  Treaty." 

*  The  British  government  published  a  memorandum  of  Lord  Cromer,  who 
declared  from  personal  investigation  that  the  population  of  the  Belgian 
bank  of  the  Nile  was  practically  extinct ;  that  the  Belgians  were  so  hated 
and  feared  that  no  Belgian  officer  could  move  outside  of  the  settlements 
without  a  strong  guard;  that  the  natives  fled  from  the  Belgian  officials;  and 
that  the  Belgian  soldiers  were  allowed  by  their  superiors  full  liberty  to 
plunder,  and  rarely  made  payment  for  supplies. 


SECONDARY  STATES'  OVERSEAS  POSSESSIONS    477 

sible  for  the  debt  of  nearly  $23,000,000.  The  status  of  the 
colony  was  established  by  a  special  law,  and  provision  was 
made  for  its  government.  The  powers  were  faced  with  a 
fait  accompli.  In  1885  they  had  erected  the  Congo  into  a 
free  and  independent  state  and  had  guaranteed  its  per- 
petual neutrality.  Germany  recognized  the  transfer  of  the 
country  to  Belgium,  but  Great  Britain  withheld  her  assent 
until  1913,  when  the  Belgian  administration  proved  that 
the  old  conditions  had  been  remedied. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  European  war  there  was 
much  discussion  about  the  future  of  the  Congo.  Germany 
intended  to  use  her  hold  on  Belgium,  if  she  had  been  able 
to  maintain  it  until  peace  negotiations  began,  as  a  trump 
card  in  the  readjustment  of  European  spheres  in  Africa. 
Had  she  been  successful  it  would  have  meant  the  realiza- 
tion of  the  German  dream  of  a  path  from  east  to  west 
across  the  continent.  The  Germans  insinuated  that  the 
great  sums  loaned  to  Belgium  by  the  Allies  were  secured 
by  an  Anglo-French  economic,  if  not  political,  mortgage  of 
the  Congo.  In  order  to  offset  this  propaganda,  the  French 
minister  handed  to  the  Belgian  minister  of  foreign  affairs 
at  Havre,  on  April  29,  1916,  a  note  that  read : 

**The  government  of  the  French  Republic  declares  that  it 
will  lend  its  aid  to  the  Belgian  government  at  the  time  of 
the  peace  negotiations  with  the  view  of  maintaining  the 
Belgian  Congo  in  its  present  territorial  status  and  of  hav- 
ing attributed  to  this  colony  a  special  indemnity  for  the 
losses  incurred  in  the  course  of  the  war." 

On  the  same  day  the  British  and  Russian  ministers  stated 
that  their  governments  adhered  to  this  declaration,  and  the 
Italian  and  Japanese  ministers  that  Italy  and  Japan  ap- 
proved of  the  French  note.  T\'Tien  the  war  ended,  in  regard 
to  the  territorial  status  quo  of  the  Congo  the  Entente 
powers  were  as  good  as  their  word.  But  the  Belgians  were 
indignant  when  they  learned  that  Great  Britain  and  France 


478         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

had  secured  the  consent  of  President  "Wilson  to  a  division 
of  the  German  colonies  in  Africa.  The  Union  of  South 
Africa  was  to  be  the  mandatory  for  German  Southwest 
Africa,  and  the  British  government  was  to  administer 
directly  German  East  Africa.  The  Belgians  raised  a  howl, 
for  they  had  helped  materially  in  the  long  war  against 
Germany  along  the  east  African  frontier  and  had  contrib- 
uted men  and  material  in  the  final  campaign.  Were  they 
to  have  no  territorial  reward?  Wlien  the  news  of  the  Big 
Four's  mandate  arrangements  reached  Brussels,  King 
Albert  went  to  Paris  by  airplane,  and  succeeded  in  wrest- 
ing from  the  British  certain  districts  of  the  new  British 
colony.  This  incident  is  worth  mentioning,  for  it  shows 
how,  before  the  treaty  of  Versailles  was  signed,  the  British 
government  had  discounted  the  mandate  idea.  The  treaty 
ceded  the  German  colonies  to  the  five  principal  allied  and 
associated  powers,  and  the  League  covenant  (article  XXII) 
provided  for  a  mandatory  regime  under  the  control  of  the 
League  of  Nations.  But  the  British  regarded  German  East 
Africa  as  theirs  by  right  of  conquest,  and  gave  a  bit  of  it 
to  the  Belgians,  who  had  helped  them  win  it. 

Spain's  colonial  empire  received  its  death-blow  in  the 
war  with  the  United  States.  Her  overseas  possessions, 
after  the  treaty  of  Paris,  were  reduced  to  three  small 
colonies  of  slight  value  and  no  importance  on  the  west 
African  coast;  a  strip  of  Guinea  coast  and  five  islands  in 
the  Gulf  of  Guinea ;  and  the  Eiff  coast  of  Morocco  opposite 
Gibraltar.^  Only  the  Spanish  colony  in  Morocco  is  of  in- 
ternational importance.  Because  of  geographical  prox- 
imity, Spain  has  been  interested  in  Morocco  since  the  Mid- 
dle Ages,  and  at  one  time  or  another  she  established  claims 
to  the  Moroccan  coast  both  on  the  Atlantic  and  on  the 
Mediterranean.     These  claims  were  not  acknowledged  by 

*  The  Canary  Islands  are  considered  by  the  Spaniards  an  integral  part  of 
their  country,  just  as  the  Portuguese  consider  the  Azores  and  Madeira.  There 
has  never  been  any  question  of  Spain  or  Portugal  parting  with  any  of 
these   islands. 


SECONDARY  STATES'  OVERSEAS  POSSESSIONS    479 

the  natives  except  when  force  was  applied,  and  they  became 
a  source  of  international  dispute  when  France  began  to 
extend  her  protectorate  over  Morocco.  After  Great  Britain 
and  Germany  had  withdrawn  their  opposition  to  the  French 
penetration  of  Morocco,  Spain  was  compelled  to  come  to 
terms  with  France.  By  the  treaty  of  Madrid,  signed  on 
November  27,  1912,  France  accepted  the  right  of  Spain  to 
exercise  her  influence  in  a  clearly  defined  Spanish  zone 
along  the  Mediterranean  for  about  two  hundred  miles,  with 
a  hinterland  averaging  sixty  miles.  The  district  of  Tangier 
was  neutralized;  but  the  Spanish  zone  extended  along  the 
hinterland  of  Tangier  to  the  Atlantic,  thus  cutting  off  Tan- 
gier from  communication  with  Fez  and  the  rest  of 
Morocco. 

A  large  portion  of  the  Spanish  zone,  called  the  Kiff,  has 
never  been  pacified,  and  occasionally  the  Spaniards  have 
been  besieged  in  their  ports.  Successful  defiance  of  Span- 
ish authority  and  the  resultant  anarchy  have  greatly  an- 
noyed and  retarded  the  French  in  their  effort  to  make 
Morocco  a  French  protectorate.  As  long  as  the  Spanish 
remain  in  possession  of  the  northern  tip  of  Morocco,  the 
development  of  Tangier  is  blocked,  and  French  administra- 
tive control  suffers.  Relations  between  Spain  and  France 
on  the  Moroccan  question  have  been  strained  for  the  past 
decade.  Since  the  World  War  France  has  attempted  to  get 
the  Spanish  out  of  Morocco.  In  1921  the  Spanish  were 
badly  beaten  by  the  natives  in  the  Riff.  In  fact,  the  dis- 
aster was  the  worst  blow  to  European  prestige  in  Africa 
since  the  Italians  were  routed  by  the  Abyssinians  at  Adowa 
twent3''-five  years  before.  But  the  Spaniards  hold  on  grimly 
to  their  last  overseas  possession.  It  is  at  once  their 
Naboth's  vineyard  and  the  souvenir  of  their  great  colonial 
empire. 

Since  the  sale  of  her  West  Indian  islands  to  the  United 
States  in  1917,  Greenland  has  been  the  only  colonial  pos- 
session of  Denmark.     Its   inhospitable   climate  and  ice- 


480  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

bound  location  make  it  of  no  international  importance. 
Iceland  was  under  Danish  rule  for  centuries,  but  received 
autonomy  in  1874.  On  November  30,  1918,  an  act  of  union 
made  Iceland  a  free  sovereign  state,  united  to  Denmark 
only  by  a  personal  bond  of  union  under  the  king  of  Den- 
mark. The  Danish  government  informed  the  powers, 
shortly  after  the  World  War  was  concluded,  that  she  recog- 
nized Iceland  as  a  sovereign  state. 

We  have  seen  how  the  Napoleonic  wars  ended  disas- 
trously for  Holland.  Her  forced  alliance  with  France  gave 
tJie  British  an  excuse  to  seize  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  to 
penalize  Holland  by  detaching  Berbice,  Demerara,  and  Es- 
sequibo  from  Surinam,  and  to  legalize  the  capture  of  the 
foreign  settlements  in  Ceylon  by  the  presidency  of  Madras. 
The  convention  of  London,  signed  on  August  13,  1814,  and 
recognized  in  the  treaty  of  Vienna,  took  from  Holland  all 
her  colonies  except  the  East  Indies,  the  island  of  CuraQoa 
in  the  West  Indies,  and  part  of  Surinam  in  South  America. 
This  agreement  has  often  been  criticized  by  British  w^riters, 
w^ho  believe  that  the  restoration  of  the  Dutch  East  Indies 
was  a  sad  and  inexplicable  blunder. 

In  extent  and  population  the  Dutch  East  Indies  are  by 
far  the  most  important  island  group  of  colonies  in  Asia 
— in  fact,  in  the  entire  world.  They  are  nearly  seven  times 
as  large  and  seven  times  as  populous  as  our  Phihppine- 
Sulu  group,  which  hes  north  of  them.  With  the  exception 
of  the  northern  side  of  Borneo,  which  is  British,  and  the 
eastern  end  of  Timor,  which  is  Portuguese,  the  Dutch  are 
in  undisputed  possession  of  all  the  islands  between  the 
Indian  Ocean  and  the  Pacific  Ocean  from  the  Strait  of 
Malacca  to  New  Guinea.  Sumatra  forms  one  side  of  the 
Strait  of  Malacca,  and  the  Riau-Lingga  archipelago  con- 
trols the  approach  to  Singapore.  Except  Java,  none  of  the 
islands  has  been  completely  pacified  or  administratively 
organized.  While  Java  has  only  one  fifth  of  the  area  of 
the  East  Indies,  her  population  is  probably  three  quarters 


SECONDARY  STATES'  OVERSEAS  POSSESSIONS    481 

of  the  total.  There  are  four  cities  in  Java  of  more  than 
100,000,  and  railways  extend  throughout  the  island. 

A  sense  of  justice  may  have  prompted  the  conquerors  of 
Napoleon  to  recognize  that  the  Dutch  alliance  with  France 
had  been  a  case  of  force  majeure,  atoned  for  by  the  aid 
given  at  Waterloo,  and  that  the  taking  of  Ceylon,  the  Cape 
of  Good  Hope,  and  a  part  of  Holland's  possessions  in 
America  was  sufficient  punishment.  But  sound  policy  dic- 
tated leaving  Holland  with  rich  colonies.  The  advantage  to 
Great  Britain  of  giving  back  the  East  Indies  may  not  have 
been  apparent  at  the  time.  Probably  it  was  not  thought  of 
at  all.  But  in  more  than  one  international  crisis  the  fear 
of  losing  her  colonies  has  acted  as  a  deterrent  to  anti- 
British  tendencies  of  Dutch  foreign  policy.  Hollanders  had 
to  be  guarded  in  the  expression  of  their  sentiments  at  the 
time  of  the  Boer  War,  In  the  World  War  joining  forces 
with  Germany  would  have  proved  as  great  a  risk  to  Hol- 
land as  taking  sides  against  Germany;  and  in  the  East 
Indies  the  Dutch,  far  less  pro-German  than  in  Holland, 
prudently  maintained  a  "benevolent"  neutrality  towards 
the  Entente.  The  influence  of  Great  Britain's  sea  power 
was  felt  by  Holland,  as  by  Italy  and  Greece. 

In  1913  a  commission  on  the  defense  of  the  West  Indies 
declared  that  it  was  necessary  for  Holland  to  build  a  fleet 
to  protect  the  colonies,  and  the  creation  of  a  new  navy  was 
already  under  way  when  Germany  precipitated  the  Euro- 
pean war.  In  view  of  the  precarious  position  of  the  pos- 
sessions in  the  East  Indies,  which  Holland  can  not  hope  to 
defend  by  her  own  means,  no  country  was  more  interested 
in  the  formation  of  a  league  of  nations  to  guarantee  the 
present  colonial  status  quo,  and,  when  that  failed,  in  the 
deliberations  of  the  Washington  conference.  The  brilliant 
prospects  for  Holland  in  the  Asiatic  colonies  are  depen- 
dent upon  world  peace  and  a  strict  prohibition  by  inter- 
national agreement  of  the  sale  of  arms  to  natives.  In  1920 
and  1921  the  United  States  engaged  in  an  acrimonious  cor- 


482         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

respondence  with  Holland  over  the  question  of  discrimina- 
tion against  Americans  in  affording  opportunities  for  the 
development  of  the  mineral  oil  resources  of  the  East  Indies. 
But  until  weak  nations  like  Holland  feel  that  their  pos- 
sessions are  secure  by  international  agreements,  and  not 
by  the  grace  of  one  or  more  great  powers,  favors  will  be 
granted — in  self-defense — to  the  nationals  of  the  power  by 
whose  good- will  they  are  allowed  to  hold  colonies. 


CHAPTER  XLIII 

FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922) 

AFTER  the  World  War,  as  before,  France  held  second 
place  to  Great  Britain  in  the  extent,  population,  dis- 
tribution, and  importance  of  her  colonial  possessions. 
These  two  powers  had  been  the  principal  beneficiaries  of 
the  treaties  of  Versailles  and  Sevres.  Japan  had  a  small 
share  in  the  division  of  the  German  colonies,  and  Italy  in- 
herited a  little  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  France  received 
Morocco,  Kamerun,  Togoland,  and  Syria. 

The  colonial  problems  of  France  fall  under  six  heads: 
(1)  the  place  of  France  in  the  Near  East;  (2)  the  place  of 
France  in  the  Far  East  and  in  the  Pacific;  (3)  the  rela- 
tions between  France  and  her  scattered  colonies;  (4)  the 
political  consolidation  of  the  north  African  empire;  (5)  the 
military  value  of  the  colonies;  and  (6)  the  economic  ex- 
ploitation of  the  colonies. 

Ever  since  the  crusades  France  has  been  interested  in 
the  Near  East,  and  after  the  eclipse  of  the  Italian  city- 
states  French  culture  and  commerce  formed  the  principal 
link  between  Europe  and  the  Christian  races  of  the  Otto- 
man Empire.  During  the  nineteenth  century  French  for- 
eign policy  attempted  to  use  ancient  treaties  and  privileges 
to  prevent  Russia  and  Great  Britain  from  gaining  a  para- 
mount influence  in  the  Near  East.  Great  Britain,  however, 
succeeded  in  getting  control  of  Cyprus  and  Egypt,  though 
both  countries  were  attached  to  France  by  ancient  bonds 
and  were  in  proximity  to  Syria,  which  France  had  coveted 
for  centuries.  By  the  agreement  of  1904,  France  withdrew 
her  opposition  to  the  consolidation  of  British  power  in  the 

483 


484         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Near  East  through  the  possession  of  Egypt  and  the  Sudan, 
in  return  for  the  withdrawal  of  British  opposition  to 
French  penetration  in  Morocco.  But  the  World  War  re- 
kindled old  aspirations,  and  France  bargained  with  Great 
Britain  to  divide  the  Arabic-speaking  portions  of  the  Otto- 
man Empire.  A\Tien  Turkey  signed  the  armistice,  Syria 
was  occupied  by  France,  and  has  been  under  French  mili- 
tary domination  ever  since. 

The  French  have  not  made  a  success  of  their  ambitious 
undertaking  in  the  northeastern  corner  of  the  Mediterra- 
nean. Only  one,  and  that  a  minority,  element  in  Syria 
wanted  France  as  mandatory ;  all  the  Syrians,  irrespective 
of  creed,  have  resented  the  mutilation  of  their  country  by 
the  exclusion  of  Palestine;  the  Moslems,  who  formed  the 
majority,  are  not  content  to  be  French  subjects,  when  in 
the  adjacent  Hedjaz  the  Arabs  are  independent  and  in 
the  adjacent  Irak  they  enjoy  autonomy.  Bad  blood  has 
been  created  by  the  contradictory  promises  made  to  the 
French  and  the  Arabs  by  the  British,  and  by  the  fact  that 
Emir  Feisal,  whom  the  French  drove  out  of  Damascus,  has 
been  made  king  of  the  Irak  by  the  British.^ 

At  first  the  French  occupied  Cilicia.  But  the  military 
pressure  and  propaganda  of  the  Turkish  nationalists  made 
them  realize  that  they  could  not  hold  this  fertile  province, 
which  they,  had  always  maintained  was  a  part  of  Syria,  and 
to  make  secure  their  position  in  the  latter  country  they 
were  compelled  in  the  summer  of  1921  to  conclude  a  treaty 
with  the  Angora  government,  by  which  they  abandoned  not 
only  Cilicia  but  also  several  districts  of  northern  Syria. 
Coming  at  the  same  time  as  the  coronation  of  Feisal  at 
Bagdad,  the  treaty  of  Angora  was  a  serious  blow  to  French 
prestige.^ 

The  French  are  finding  the  occupation  of  Syria  expen- 
sive, dangerous,  and  fruitless.  It  makes  them  offend  the 
susceptibilities  of  the  Mohammedans,  which  they  can  ill 

^See  p.  440.  'See  pp.  436-437,  454. 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922)        485 

afford  to  do ;  it  gives  rise  to  friction  with  the  British ;  and 
it  demands  soldiers  and  money  that  France  does  not  have 
to  give.  This  situation  was  foreseen  by  many  prominent 
Frenchmen,  who  beheved  that  France  should  not  attempt 
to  extend  her  authority  in  the  Mediterranean  east  of  Tu- 
nisia, unless  it  were  to  occupy  Constantinople.  These 
critics  of  the  Syrian  policy  pointed  out  that  France  had  no 
bases  in  neighboring  territories,  as  the  British  had  in 
handhng  Mesopotamia  and  Palestine.  Syria,  they  said, 
would  always  be  a  drain  on  France,  and  the  French  hold 
precarious;  while  Constantinople  could  be  managed  by  a 
few  war-vessels,  without  expense  or  risk  to  prestige. 

The  place  of  France  in  the  Far  East  and  in  the  Pacific 
does  not  involve,  as  in  the  Near  East,  embarking  upon  a 
new  and  complicated  venture,  with  disadvantages  out- 
weighing advantages.  In  Indo-China  a  rich  colonial  empire 
had  been  created  before  the  war,  and  its  development  had 
not  brought  France  into  conflict  with  other  European 
powers.^  The  only  danger  that  could  menace  Indo-China 
was  Japanese  aggression.  France  could  not  hope  to  defend 
Indo-China  against  Japan,  and  in  the  logic  of  events  it  has 
seemed  that  the  next  challenge  to  Europe  issued  by  Japan 
would  be  against  France.^  But,  fortunately  for  France, 
Great  Britain  holds  Hong-Kong  and  Kowloon  and  the 
United  States  the  Philippines,  which  are  strategically  at 
the  mercy  of  Japan.  Until  these  powers  become  enemies, 
Japan  will  have  to  wait.  The  only  other  way  that  France 's 
present  position  in  the  Far  East  can  be  questioned  is  if, 
because  of  the  maintenance  of  high  export  and  import 
duties  in  Indo-China,  Japan  and  the  United  States  raise  in 
diplomatic  conference  the  question  of  bringing  once  more 

^  In  their  respective  encroachments  upon  the  sovereignty  of  China  and  Siam, 
Great  Britain  and  France  had  reached  a  common  frontier,  which  threatened 
friction.  The  British  charged  that  the  French  advance  of  frontier  violated 
an  Anglo-Chinese  treaty  (see  pp.  61-62).  Differences  of  opinion  were  settled 
by  the  Anglo-I^ench  agreement  of  1904  (see  pp.  192-193). 

*  See  the  opening  paragraphs  of  Chapters  X,  XII,  and  XXVIII. 


486         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITIC^ 

under  Chinese  suzerainty  her  former  outlying  provinces 
and  tributary  kingdoms.^ 

The  British  delegates  at  the  Washington  conference 
argued  that  overseas  possessions  necessitated  a  large 
navy.  This  argument  provoked  discussion  in  Paris  con- 
cerning the  relations  between  France  and  her  scattered 
colonies.  The  Pacific  islands  are  taken  care  of  by  the 
four-power  treaty,  signed  during  the  Washington  confer- 
ence. But  France  has  also  Guadeloupe  and  Martinique  in 
the  West  Indies;  a  colony  in  Guiana  on  the  South  Ameri- 
can continent ;  the  little  islands  of  St.  Pierre  and  Miquelon 
off  Labrador;  and  Eeuuion,  Mayotte,  the  Comoro  Islands, 
and  Madagascar,  off  the  east  coast  of  Africa.  On  the  Afri- 
can continent  Djibouti  is  an  isolated  colony  of  the  Somali 
coast  at  the  entrance  of  the  Ked  Sea.  These  possessions, 
for  the  most  part  remnants  of  France's  ancient  colonial 
empire,  and  closely  attached  on  sentimental  grounds  to  the 
mother  country,  are,  as  well  as  the  French  possessions  in 
India,  not  near  one  another.  Great  Britain  has  all  her 
colonies  and  dependencies,  on  mainland  and  island,  closely 
linked  together.  In  addition,  she  controls  the  seas.  In 
sea  power,  France  has  bound  herself  at  Washington  to  the 
ratio  of  1.75  to  5  in  relation  to  Great  Britain.  If  she  later 
agrees  to  admit  limitation  of  submarines  and  light  surface 
craft  to  the  same  ratio  as  that  decided  upon  for  capital 
ships,  France  is  likely  to  demand  the  extension  of  the 
principle  of  guaranty,  confined  to  Pacific  islands  in  the 
four-power  treaty,  to  possessions  throughout  the  world. 
Pushed  to  its  logical  conclusion,  the  coupling  of  a  guaranty 
with  the  fixing  of  a  ratio  in  naval  and  military  strength 
means  the  adoption  by  the  great  powers  of  a  more  specific 
mutual  guaranty  of  the  world-wide  status  quo  than  that 
implied  in  article  X  of  the  League  of  Nations  covenant. 

^  During  the  Washington  conference  the  question  was  frequently  asked, 
"What  is  China?"  If  China  includes  Manchuria  and  the  two  Mongolias, 
does  not  her  sovereignty  (once  we  start  tampering  with  the  existing  situation) 
extend  over  Indo-China  and  the  maritime  province  of  Eussia? 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922)         487 

The  evolution  of  French  foreign  and  colonial  policy  since 
1900,  culminating  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles  at  the  end  of 
a  successful  war,  has  tended  principally  to  the  creation  of 
a  consolidated  north  African  empire.  A  glance  at  the  map 
will  show  why  the  Moroccan  question  was  considered  of 
sufficient  importance  for  French  statesmen  to  abandon 
Egypt  and  the  Sudan  to  Great  Britain,  thus  renouncing 
the  dream  of  a  French  belt  across  Africa;  to  antagonize 
Germany  to  the  point  of  war;  and  to  pursue  a  policy 
towards  Spain  which,  after  the  World  War,  remains  un- 
compromisingly hostile.^  First  of  all,  Morocco  was  needed 
to  make  Algeria  secure ;  and  then,  when  France  expanded 
across  the  Sahara  Desert,  it  was  realized  that  the  African 
empire  of  French  dreams  would  be  practicable  strategi- 
cally, politically,  and  economically  only  if  France  controlled 
Morocco.  The  protectorate  of  1912  received  international 
sanction  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles.  Moreover,  Germany's 
two  colonies  in  west  Africa  were  given  to  France,  and  the 
British  consented  to  changes  in  the  boundaries  of  Nigeria. 
The  acquisition  of  Togoland  removed  the  fly  in  France's 
ointment  in  west  Africa,  and  the  elimination  of  Germany 
in  equatorial  Africa  gave  France  a  clear  sweep  of  territory 
from  the  Congo  to  the  Mediterranean. 

Through  Algeria,  Tunisia,  and  now  Morocco,  all  parts 
of  the  French  north  African  empire  can  be  reached  by  land. 
Airplanes  have  radically  changed  the  great  problem  of  the 
Sahara  Desert,  and  it  is  probable  that  within  the  next  few 
years  railways  will  reach  from  Tunis  to  Lake  Chad  and  the 
Congo,  and  from  Algiers  to  Timbuktu,  Senegal,  and  Da- 
homey. By  the  Atlantic  the  distance  is  not  great  from 
Bordeaux  to  the  Moroccan,  west  African,  and  equatorial 
African  ports.    From  the  double  standpoint  of  defense  and 

^  See  p.  479.  Although  economic  reasons  are  advanced,  the  refusal  of 
France  to  renew  her  tariff  convention  with  Spain  (February,  1922)  is  due 
to  the  Moroccan  question.  French  public  opinion  demands  the  withdrawal  of 
the  Spanish  from  their  Morocean  zones  if  they  are  unwilling  and  unable 
to  maintain  order  there. 


488         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

economic  opportunity,  no  colonial  possession  of  a  Euro- 
pean power  rivals  France's  north  African  empire.  France 
does  not  have  the  problem  of  distance. 

But  as  her  African  colonies  are  developed  and  become 
more  essential  to  the  well-being  of  France,  French  states- 
men see  the  vital  importance  of  naval  control  in  the  western 
part  of  the  Mediterranean.  The  future  of  the  north  Afri- 
can colonies  depends  upon  the  ability  of  France  to  assure 
against  interruption  from  any  quarter  communications  be- 
tween Marseilles  and  Cette  and  the  Mediterranean  African 
ports.  Unless,  by  agreement  or  independently,  France  en- 
joys naval  supremacy  in  the  Mediterranean,  it  will  be 
unwise  for  her  to  grow  to  look  upon  the  north  African 
empire  as  an  extension  of  France  and  a  reservoir  of  sol- 
diers, food-stuffs,  and  raw  materials.  This  situation 
threatens  to  precipitate  a  new  crisis  in  international  rela- 
tions. Italy  is  wholly  a  Mediterranean  powder,  and,  if  she 
can  not  control  the  Mediterranean  herself,  she  prefers  to 
see  Great  Britain  and  France  offset  each  other.  Great 
Britain  regards  the  Mediterranean  as  an  essential  link 
between  the  mother  country,  India,  and  Australasia,  and 
ever  since  the  Suez  Canal  was  cut  her  foreign  policy  has 
aimed  at  control  of  this  sea.^ 

The  part  played  by  colonial  troops,  chiefly  blacks,  in 
resisting  the  German  invasion  of  1914,  and,  in  fact,  through- 
out the  World  War,  has  not  been  minimized  or  forgotten 
by  the  French.  The  Latin  races  do  not  share  our  Anglo- 
Saxon  prejudice  against  colored  peoples.  The  French 
frankly  admitted  their  debt  to  Africans  and  Asiatics  in 

^  The  naval  agreement  between  Great  Britain  and  France  before  the  World 
War,  which  seemingly  gave  France  the  preponderance  of  naval  power  in  the 
Mediterranean,  was  concluded  for  a  specific  purpose,  i.  e.,  holding  Germany 
in  check,  and  was  not  intended  by  the  British  to  be  even  a  tacit  acknowledg- 
ment of  France's  right  to  a  larger  navy  than  Great  Britain's  in  the  Medi- 
terranean. If  France  had  acted  in  opposition  to  any  British  interests,  there 
was  nothing  in  the  agreement  to  prevent  the  British  from  sending  to  Hie 
Mediterranean  all  the  ships  they  wanted  to.  The  new  principle,  adopled 
at  Washington,  of  limitation  of  fleets  by  scrapping  and  a  naval  holiday, 
brings  up  a  new  strategic  problem.  It  takes  away  the  potential  ability  of 
sending  ships  when  needed  to  assert  the  authority  of  the  greaf  naval  power. 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922)         489 

winning  the  war,  and  did  not  hesitate  to  station  colonial 
troops  in  the  occupied  regions  of  Germany.  We  regard  as 
negroes  any  race  with  an  admixture  of  negro  blood,  and 
we  class  among  colored  races  virtually  all  Africans  and 
Asiatics.  To  the  French,  the  Tunisians,  Algerians,  Ber- 
bers, Moroccans,  Malagasy,  and  Indo-Chinese  are  not  in 
any  essential  different  from  white  people.  Only  the  natives 
of  west  and  equatorial  Africa  are  blacks,  and  the  French, 
while  agreeing  that  these  people  are  different  from  us, 
none  the  less  receive  them  socially  and  allow  them  the  right 
to  marry  whites. 

It  is  necessary  for  us  to  understand  this  when  we  discuss 
what  is  one  of  the  most  important  values  of  the  colonies 
from  the  French  point  of  view.  In  their  eyes  Africans  and 
Asiatics  are  a  military  asset,  and  can  be  used  in  Europe 
in  time  of  peace  as  well  as  in  time  of  war  to  offset  the  dis- 
crepancy in  population  between  the  French  and  the  Ger- 
mans. When  an  Englishman  or  an  American  expresses  his 
misgiving  for  the  future  of  France  in  relation  to  Germany 
on  the  score  of  population,  the  Frenchman  answers  calmly, 
*'But  we  have  our  colonials."  The  government,  in  Janu- 
ary, 1922,  increased  the  colonial  quota  from  200,000  to  300,- 
000,  about  fifty  per  cent,  of  the  total  mobilized  strength  of 
the  French  army.  Conscription  is  in  force  in  the  colonies, 
as  in  France,  but  with  this  difference:  the  native  levies, 
especially  in  west  and  central  Africa,  are  being  organized 
and  developed  with  the  idea  of  making  them  infantry  divi- 
sions to  be  used  by  France  in  Europe  and  the  Near  East, 
while  French  conscripts  are  not  ordered  on  foreign  service 
except  in  time  of  war. 

Article  XXII  of  the  League  covenant  provides  for  peo- 
ples, ^'especially  those  of  central  Africa,"  who  are 
governed  under  the  mandate  regime,  freedom  from  ''mili- 
tary training  for  other  than  police  purposes  and  the  de- 
fense of  territory."  Without  waiting  for  League  approval, 
the  French  government  pubUshed,  on  March  25,  1921,  a 


490         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

decree  establishing  a  form  of  government  for  Kamerun  and 
Togoland.  This  decree  authorized  the  raising  and  training 
of  conscript  armies,  as  in  other  French  African  colonies. 
France  interprets  the  expression  ''the  defense  of  terri- 
tory" to  mean  the  defense  of  French  territory  any^vhere 
in  the  world.  It  is  an  old  thesis,  and  not  an  unreasonable 
one,  that  the  obligation  of  protection  is  mutual.  A  mother 
country  defends  her  colonies,  and  it  is  their  duty  to  help 
defend  her,  if  for  no  other  reason  than  that  in  her  security 
and  prosperity  lie  their  security  and  prosperity. 

But  the  training  of  Africans  for  military  service  has 
other  aspects  than  the  one  uppermost  in  French  minds, 
which  is,  of  course,  drawing  upon  the  vast  reservoir  of 
subject  peoples  to  make  up  for  disparity  in  population 
between  the  mother  country  and  her  great  enemy.  These 
aspects  will  readily  be  grasped  by  the  reader.  We  have 
space  to  mention  only  two  of  them.  If  France  counts  on 
Africans  to  maintain  her  position  in  Europe,  she  will  have 
to  adopt  a  naval  policy  that  aims  at  the  control  of  the 
Mediterranean  Sea.  If  by  conscription  the  natives  of 
Africa  are  trained  to  fight  and  are  in  possession  of 
weapons,  France  and  the  other  powers  with  colonies  in 
Africa  may  find  in  the  course  of  time  that  their  subjects 
can  not  be  longer  exploited  with  impunity.  They  will  de- 
mand self-government  and  the  use  of  their  labor  and  their 
natural  wealth  for  the  benefit  of  their  own  country.  This 
is  already  happening  in  the  older  French  colonies,  in  Al- 
geria, and  in  Tunisia. 

Much  has  been  written  since  the  World  War  of  the  great 
wealth  of  the  French  colonies,  and  of  the  economic  advan- 
tages France  will  enjoy  from  their  development.  The  value 
of  the  north  African  empire,  for  food-stuffs  as  well  as  for 
soldiers,  was  amply  demonstrated  during  the  war.  And 
in  the  decade  before  the  war  the  increase  in  prosperity  of 
the  colonies  had  been  marvelous.  From  the  figures  of  1920 
and  1921  one  sees  that  the  colonies  have  not  suffered  by 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922)         491 

the  war,  except  in  the  cessation  of  works  of  public  utility 
and  of  the  development  of  concessions  through  lack  of  capi- 
tal and  through  the  inability  of  French  industry  to  furnish 
railway  and  other  materials  and  machinery.  Capital,  how- 
ever, is  now  being  found  again,  despite  the  serious  situa- 
tion of  French  finances,  and  steel  plants  and  machine  works 
are  again  able  to  export  to  the  colonies. 

The  difficulties  that  confront  France  in  the  economic 
development  of  her  colonial  possessions  are  the  lack  of 
administrators  and  colonists  and  the  maintenance  of  high 
protective  tariffs  for  the  benefit  of  the  mother  country. 

As  compared  with  the  British,  the  French  have  always 
suffered  from  poor  material  in  civilian  colonial  adminis- 
trators. The  French  army  has  furnished  splendid  men  to 
the  colonies,  but  the  general  run  of  officials  has  been  and 
still  is  decidedly  second-rate.  Social  and  economic  condi- 
tions in  France  militate  against  recruiting  high-grade  men 
for  service  abroad.  The  upper  classes  do  not  have  younger 
sons  to  find  posts  for,  and  life  and  opportunities  at  home 
are  sufficiently  attractive  to  prevent  the  type  of  man  that 
enters  the  British  colonial  service  from  seeking  a  career 
in  the  French  colonies.  The  same  handicap  hurts  the 
French  in  finding  good  business  men  to  cast  in  their  for- 
tunes with  the  colonies.  There  is  a  hvelihood  for  all  ca- 
pable men  in  France  better  than  they  could  earn  abroad. 
So  why  exile? 

Spaniards,  Italians,  and  Jews,  and  not  Frenchmen,  form 
the  bulk  of  the  European  element  in  Algeria,  Tunisia,  and 
Morocco.  Since  the  original  decree  bestowing  citizenship 
on  the  Jews  of  Algeria,  the  French  government  has 
struggled  with  the  problem  of  making  the  census  figures 
show  an  increase  in  the  French  population.  But  France 
has  no  excess  population,  and  there  is  little  more  emigra- 
tion to  north  Africa  than  to  any  other  part  of  the  world. 
The  French  stay  at  home.  Climatic  considerations  would 
keep  emigrants  from  northern  and  central  France,  if  there 


492  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

were  any,  from  choosing  the  northern  coast  of  Africa  for 
colonization.  Tunisia,  Algeria,  and  Morocco,  however,  are 
near  Italy,  and  Italy  has  an  excess  population,  a  large  part 
of  which  finds  the  countries  on  the  opposite  coast  of  the 
Mediterranean  adapted  to  its  climatic  needs.  If  Spain 
begins  to  follow  Italy  in  developing  an  excess  population, 
and  France  remains  stationary,  it  will  be  hard  for  France 
to  justify — and  also  to  profit  by — her  occupation  of  the 
major  portion  of  Mediterranean  lands  suitable  for  Euro- 
pean colonization.  The  question  is  bound  to  arise,  and, 
like  that  of  permanently  maintaining  military  superiority 
over  Germany,  how  it  will  be  answered  depends,  in  the  final 
analysis,  upon  the  comparative  fecundity  of  the  French 
with  neighboring  European  peoples. 

Great  Britain  has  developed  self-governing  dominions  in 
different  parts  of  the  world,  and  she  herself  has  become  a 
great  industrial  and  maritime  nation.  British  colonies  help 
one  another  to  greater  prosperity  by  their  number,  their 
natural  trade,  and  their  positions  on  trade  routes ;  and  all 
benefit  by  the  remarkable  development  of  commerce  and 
communication  between  Great  Britain,  India,  and  the  self- 
governing  dominions.  The  British  have  been  so  far  ahead 
of  other  nations  in  the  organization  of  their  commerce  and 
in  their  control  of  the  carrying  trade  that  they  could  afford 
to  let  other  nations  do  business  with  their  colonies  on  equal 
terms.  Only  in  recent  years  have  there  been  preferential 
tariffs  within  the  British  Empire,  and  these  have  not  been 
onerous,  nor  have  they  prevented  a  colony  from  excepting 
particular  products  where  it  was  to  its  advantage  to  do  so. 

The  French  conception  of  the  relations  between  the  colo- 
nies and  the  mother  country  is  different.  The  colonies  exist 
primarily  for  the  benefit  of  France;  hence  heavy  import 
and  export  duties  imposed  on  the  rest  of  the  world  are 
omitted  in  favor  of  French  merchants,  and  French  ship- 
ping is  everywhere  given  the  preference.  If  France  was 
in  the  position,  as  an  industrial  state,  to  sell  to  and  buy 


FRENCH  COLONIAL  PROBLEMS  (1901-1922)         493 

from  all  her  colonies,  and,  as  a  maritime  power,  to  give 
them  excellent  service,  they  might  not  suffer  in  comparison 
with  the  colonies  of  Great  Britain.  But,  as  matters  stand, 
it  is  difficult  to  see  how  the  French  colonies  are  going  to 
keep  pace  in  prosperity  with  the  British,  unless  they  are 
allowed  to  trade  on  equal  terms  with  the  whole  world  and 
avail  themselves  of  the  world's  shipping. 

The  way  that  France  has  fenced  off  her  colonies  against 
the  rest  of  the  world  (and  she  is  trying  to  do  this  now  in 
Morocco  also)  brings  up  a  burning  issue  in  world  politics. 
A  Frenchman  has  stated  it  in  these  words:  ''La  question 
s'ouvre,  de  savoir  si  les  autres  peuples  tolereront  indefini- 
ment  que  nous  privions  la  communaute  humaine  des  res- 
sources  preparees  pour  son  bien-etre  par  la  nature."  ^  The 
French  themselves  realize  that  exploitation  and  monopoly 
can  not  continue  indefinitely.  Subject  peoples  will  demand 
the  right  to  trade  on  equal  terms  with  other  nations  than 
France.  The  other  nations,  if  they  find  that  France  is  not 
using  and  developing  the  resources  of  her  colonies,  will 
demand  the  open  door.  Whether  they  get  it — and  here  is 
the  heart  of  the  world  politics  of  to-morrow — will  depend 
upon  which  is  stronger,  the  power  barring  the  door  or  the 
power  trying  to  open  it. 

^  See  TJ.  Gohier  in  La  Vieille-France,  March  17,  1921. 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

BEITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922) 

THE  World  War  put  the  British  Empire  to  severe  test. 
Would  the  structure  stand  the  triple  strain  of  years 
of  exhausting  fighting  in  Europe,  economic  disorganization 
resulting  from  interruption  of  sea-borne  trade  and  com- 
munications, and  disaffection  among  subject  peoples'? 
More  decisively  than  most  observers  expected,  the  answer 
was  affirmative;  an  outstanding  phenomenon  of  the  war 
was  the  solidarity  of  the  British  Empire.  From  the  very 
first  days,  the  self-governing  dominions  and  India  contrib- 
uted men  and  money  without  stint;  the  troubles  feared  in 
Egypt  did  not  materialize ;  and  rebellions  in  south  Africa 
and  Ireland  were  short-lived.  Facts  seemed  to  prove  that 
Cecil  Rhodes  was  a  poorer  prophet  than  Otto  von  Bis- 
marck. Rhodes  had  said  that  Great  Britain  as  an  empire 
could  not  afford  to  fight  Germany,  while  Bismarck  had 
prophesied  that  Germany  would  not  win  a  general  Euro- 
pean war  if  Russia  were  on  the  other  side.  But  was  Rhodes 
wrong?  The  answer  depends  upon  whether  we  find  that 
Great  Britain  has  come  out  of  the  war  stronger  and  more 
prosperous  as  a  world  power  than  when  she  entered  it. 

The  greatest  difficulty,  in  discussing  British  imperial 
problems  in  the  light  of  the  World  War,  lies  in  the  correct 
appreciation  of  war  events  and  war  conditions  in  relation 
to  the  political  situation  confronting  the  empire  at  home 
and  overseas.  Speaking  in  the  House  of  Commons  on  Feb- 
ruary 14,  1922,  on  conditions  in  India,  Mr.  Lloyd  George 
reminded  the  members  of  Parliament  that  it  was  impossible 
to  consider  events  and  conditions  since  1914  as  solely  re- 
sponsible for  the  grave  crisis  confronting  British  rule  in 

494 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         493 

India.  He  said  that  as  far  back  as  1906  Lord  Morley  kept 
calling  the  attention  of  the  government  to  the  serious 
unrest  in  India.  The  general  cause  was  the  contact  of 
Asia  with  Western  education,  and  the  particular  cause  was 
the  success  of  Japan  in  the  Russo-Japanese  War.  The 
World  War  simply  gave  the  agitators  new  arguments  and 
made  the  people  more  ready  to  listen  and  to  be  influenced 
by  agitation  than  before.  This  caution  we  must  bear  in 
mind  in  discussing  the  various  problems  of  the  British 
Empire.  In  the  Near  East  and  in  the  Far  East,  as  in 
India,  what  has  happened  since  1914  is  the  development  of 
resistance  against  European  overlordship  and  exploitation, 
which  received  its  first  great  impulsion  from  the  success 
of  Japan  in  blocking  the  further  extension  of  European 
eminent  domain  in  Asia.  The  troubles  in  Ireland,  Egypt, 
and  South  Africa  go  back  to  the  nineteenth  century.  The 
burning  question  of  adjusting,  on  a  basis  satisfactory  to 
the  last,  the  political  and  economic  relations  between 
Great  Britain  and  her  self-governing  dominions  has  been 
an  issue  ever  since  the  Boer  War. 

Speaking  broadly,  the  tie  that  binds  the  British  Empire 
is  that  of  interest.  And  it  is  the  same  tie,  whether,  in  the 
case  of  the  self-governing  dominions,  one  calls  it  maternal 
or  filial  affection,  or,  in  the  case  of  some  of  the  colonies, 
conscious  dependence,  or,  in  the  case  of  subject  peoples  held 
against  their  will,  bearing  the  white  man's  burden.  The 
British  Empire  grew  to  its  present  dimensions  because  it 
paid  the  English  to  have  overseas  possessions.  For  the 
benefit  of  the  industries  and  commerce  of  the  United  King- 
dom, the  British  invaded  and  conquered  large  parts  of 
Africa  and  Asia  and  annexed  islands  all  over  the  world. 
In  regions  of  the  temperate  zone,  where  white  settlement 
was  possible,  the  mother  country  was  compelled  to  grant 
the  colonists  self-government,  and  relations  were  gradually 
adjusted  until  they  rested  upon  mutual  interests.  In  all 
other  parts  of  the  empire  the  British  ruled  by  force  and 


496         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

for  the  benefit  of  the  United  Kingdom,  which  furnished  the 
force  and  paid  the  bills.  In  the  final  analysis,  however,  the 
relations  between  Great  Britain  and  her  self-governing 
dominions  will  be  governed  by  the  element  of  mutual  ad- 
vantage in  the  association,  and  between  Great  Britain  and 
her  subject  peoples  the  relations  will  remain  as  they  are 
if  the  British  continue  to  believe  that  it  pays  to  hold  these 
people  in  subjection  and  if  they  continue  to  have  the  money 
and  man  power  to  do  so. 

At  the  time  the  revolt  of  the  American  colonies  was 
brewing,  the  British  government,  in  order  to  prevent  the 
spread  of  the  movement  to  Canada,  by  the  Quebec  Act  of 
1774,  granted  the  recently  acquired  French  of  Quebec  a 
large  measure  of  autonomy.  Later  Canada,  which  was  be- 
coming preponderantly  an  English-speaking  country  neigh- 
boring on  the  United  States  and  developing  in  the  same 
way  as  the  United  States,  could  never  have  been  kept 
within  the  British  Empire  on  any  other  basis  than  that  of 
autonomous,  representative  institutions.  This  furnished 
the  example  for  Australia  and  New  Zealand  when  they 
increased  in  wealth  and  population  sufficiently  to  stand 
upon  their  own  feet.  As  the  alternative  to  constant  re- 
bellion, very  costly  to  put  down.  South  Africa  was  made  a 
self-governing  dominion  within  the  decade  after  the  Boer 
War.  Following  upon  five  years  of  armed  resistance  to 
British  authority,  Ireland  (except  Ulster)  was  given  do- 
minion status  in  January,  1922,  under  the  name  of  the 
Irish  Free  State.  With  the  exception  of  Canada,  the  self- 
governing  dominions  have  come  into  existence  in  the  twen- 
tieth century:  Australia,  1901;  New  Zealand,  1907;  South 
Africa,  1910;  and  Ireland,  1922. 

Following  the  example  of  Canada,  all  of  the  self-govern- 
ing dominions  have  shown,  from  the  beginning  of  their 
quasi-independent  existence,  the  determination  to  place 
their  own  interests  ahead  of  those  of  the  mother  country, 
and  to  demand  a  share  in  shaping  imperial  policies  and 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         497 

enjoying  imperial  privileges  if  they  were  to  be  expected  to 
assume  imperial  responsibilities.  This  has  caused  them  to 
question  and  deny  the  original  credo  of  world  politics,  i.  e., 
that  the  extra-European  world  existed  for  the  benefit  of 
Europe.  At  the  time  of  the  Boer  War,  Sir  Wilfrid  Laurier 
answered  the  British  government's  appeal  for  a  contribu- 
tion in  money  and  troops  in  the  following  terse  sentence: 
**  Canada  does  not  intend  to  be  drawn  into  the  vortex  of 
European  militarism."  Later  the  Canadian  government 
decided  that,  if  Canada  were  to  be  called  upon  to  contribute 
to  the  support  of  the  imperial  navy,  the  ships  should  be 
used  in  Canadian  waters,  be  manned  by  Canadian  officers, 
and  fly  the  Canadian  flag.  These  demands  were  afterwards 
modified,  but  have  since  been  renewed.  Another  signifi- 
cant illustration  of  Canada's  feeling  of  separateness  is  the 
desire  intimated  to  the  British  government  by  the  Ottawa 
government  that  British  titles  and  honors  be  not  conferred 
upon  Canadians.^  A  strong  sentiment  showed  itself  in 
Canada  and  Australia  in  favor  of  Irish  aspirations.  Can- 
ada and  the  other  dominions  have  established  their  claim 
to  complete  tariff  autonomy,  but,  because  of  trade  advan- 
tages, are  willing  to  grant  imperial  preference  in  their 
tariif  schedules. 

At  the  outbreak  of  the  war  between  Great  Britain  and 
Germany,  the  self-governing  dominions  did  not  hesitate  to 
throw  in  their  lot  immediately  with  the  mother  country. 
The  trade  and  naval  menace  of  the  German  Empire,  and 
moral  indignation  against  Germany,  were  factors  that 
worked  as  strongly  in  the  dominions  as  in  England.  In 
addition,  South  Africa  had  been  feeling  keenly  the  develop- 
ment of  the  neighboring  German  colonies  in  Africa,  and 

*  A  special  committee  of  the  Canadian  House  of  Commons  was  appointed 
in  April,  1919,  to  consider  the  question  of  titles  in  Canada,  and  it  was  unani- 
mously recommended  that  hereditary  titles  should  cease  upon  the  death  of  the 
present  holders,  and,  by  a  large  majority,  that  no  further  titles,  knight- 
hoods, and  minor  orders  should  be  bestowed  by  the  British  crown  upon 
Canadian  citizens.  These  recommendations  were  subsequently  ratified  by 
Parliament. 


498         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Australia  and  New  Zealand  of  German  colonial  expansion 
in  the  Pacific.  But  the  participation  of  the  dominions  in 
the  war,  involving  the  raising  and  sending  of  armies  to 
Europe  and  heavy  expenditures,  naturally  led  them  to  de- 
mand representation  in  the  imperial  war  cabinet,  and  from 
this  to  separate  delegates  at  the  peace  conference  and  to 
membership  in  the  League  of  Nations  the  steps  were  logi- 
cal. The  heads  of  the  governments  of  the  dominions  im- 
pressed upon  London  the  patent  fact  that  they  must  have 
some  say  in  the  conduct  of  the  war  and  the  shaping  of  the 
policies  to  be  adopted  when  peace  was  made.  So  far  as 
the  conduct  of  the  war,  in  its  diplomatic  as  well  as  its 
military  phases,  was  concerned,  these  demands  proved  to 
be  impracticable.  For  the  British  cabinet  derives  its 
authority  from  a  parliament  representing  the  people  of  the 
United  Kingdom. 

At  a  conference  of  premiers  in  London,  in  1907,  the 
virtual  independence  of  the  dominions  and  their  equality 
with  the  United  Kingdom  had  already  been  recognized  by 
the  adoption  of  the  principle  that  ''the  Crown  is  the  su- 
preme executive  in  the  United  Kingdom  and  in  all  the 
dominions,  but  it  acts  on  the  advice  of  different  ministries 
within  different  constitutional  limits."^  But  this  did  not 
solve  the  problem  of  the  participation  of  the  dominions  in 
all-important  matters  of  common  imperial  concern.  How 
could  the  dominions  be  given  an  adequate  voice  in  foreign 
policy  and  in  the  conduct  of  foreign  relations'?  The  par- 
ticipation of  the  dominions  in  the  peace  conference  and 
their  separate  membership  in  the  League  of  Nations  em- 
phasized their  sovereign  status.  But  it  is  difficult  to  see 
how  the  dominions  can  expect  to  have  a  voice  in  British 
foreign  policy  under  the  present  system.  They  can  advise 
and  warn,  as  they  did  in  1921  in  the  matter  of  the  Anglo- 
Japanese  alliance.    This  right  of  advising  the  British  pre- 

*See  C.  P.  Hallinan's  letter  from  London  in  the  New  Republic,  February  8, 
1922. 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         499 

mier,  however,  does  not  give  the  dominions  a  share  in  con- 
ducting the  activities  of  the  Foreign  Office,  the  War  Office, 
and  the  Colonial  Office,  whose  heads  are  responsible  only 
to  a  parliament  elected  by  the  people  of  England  and 
Scotland.  At  the  present  time  England  and  Scotland  have 
a  population  much  larger  than  that  of  the  self-governing 
dominions  combined,  even  when  we  exclude  Ireland  from 
Great  Britain  and  put  her  population  with  that  of  the  do- 
minions. But  the  time  is  coming  when  the  dominions  will 
outnumber  the  mother  country. 

As  far  as  the  self-governing  dominions  are  concerned, 
the  danger  to  the  solidarity  of  the  British  Empire  is  in 
the  inevitable  divergency  of  interests  that  will  arise  from 
divergent  political  and  economic  conditions,  and  from  the 
desire  of  the  dominions,  if  they  are  to  assume  the  burden 
of  empire,  to  share  in  the  privileges  of  empire.  These  dan- 
gers have  already  appeared.  Canadians,  Australians,  and 
New  Zealanders  looked  upon  the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance, 
which  was  advantageous  to  British  political  and  trade  in- 
terests in  the  Far  East,  as  exceedingly  disadvantageous  to 
their  interests.  If  the  situation  in  India  and  China  should 
make  wise,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  United  Kingdom 's 
interests,  a  new  understanding  in  the  future  between  Great 
Britain  and  Japan,  what  would  be  the  attitude  of  the  Brit- 
ish dominions  that  feel  the  expansion  of  Japan  to  be  a 
menace  to  their  security?  Are  Hong-Kong  and  India  more 
important  to  Great  Britain  than  the  maintenance  of  the 
only  slightly  profitable  political  tie  with  Australia,  New 
Zealand,  and  Canada? 

At  the  peace  conference  South  Africa,  Australia,  and 
New  Zealand  demanded  their  share  of  the  German  colonies. 
If  India,  Egypt,  and  other  countries  continue  to  be  held 
in  subjection  to  Great  Britain,  with  the  aid  of  self-govern- 
ing dominions,  it  is  reasonable  that  the  dominion  premiers 
will  be  demanding  a  share  of  the  good  jobs  and  that  do- 
minion trade  interests  be  considered  in  the  exploitation  of 


500         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

these  countries.  On  the  other  hand,  the  sponsorship  by 
the  British  government  of  the  policy  of  Australia  and  New 
Zealand,  to  exclude  Asiatics  from  settlement  in  vast  regions 
that  they  themselves  can  not  colonize  or  develop,  embar- 
rasses the  British  in  India  and  imperils  future  relations 
with  Japan.i 

The  self-governing  dominions  are  virtually  lost  to  Great 
Britain  except  in  a  sentimental  way.  In  time  of  war  they 
are  not  likely  again  to  prove  themselves  a  precious  asset, 
if  their  own  interests  are  not  involved.  They  are  not  of 
as  much  benefit  to  the  industries  and  commerce  of  Great 
Britain  as  the  British  tax-payer  might  in  justice  hope  for. 
The  dominions  exact  a  quid  pro  quo,  and  there  is  a  question 
in  the  Englishman's  mind  as  to  whether  they  do  not  get 
more  than  they  give.  Canada  largely  made  her  own  way. 
But  Australia  and  New  Zealand  were  liabilities  to  the 
British  tax-payer  for  several  decades,  while  the  people  of 
the  United  Kingdom  are  saddled  with  a  heavy  debt  owing 
to  their  activities  in  making  possible  the  Union  of  South 
Africa.  The  United  Kingdom  will  never  get  a  return  upon 
the  South  African  investment.  It  may  be  true  that  Ireland 
was  held  in  subjection  because  of  her  unfortunate  geo- 
graphical position  and  for  economic  reasons.  But  for  a 
hundred  years  the  English  paid  dearly  for  the  doubtful 
privilege  of  ruling  Ireland.  No  European  nation  has  bene- 
fited from  the  exploitation,  or  rather  attempt  at  exploita- 
tion, of  peoples  of  European  stock.  The  relation  of  master 
and  servant  between  Europeans  and  Asiatics  and  Africans, 
on  the  contrary,  has  generally  proved  so  profitable,  up  to 
the  war  of  1914,  that  the  European  nations  were  will- 
ing to  risk  wars  mth  one  another  in  order  to  enjoy  that 
privilege. 

At  the  Paris  conference,  and  again  at  the  Washington 
conference,  India  was  represented  by  separate  delegates  in 
the  same  way  as  the  self-governing  dominions,  and  India 

^  See  p.  516,  especially  the  foot-note,  and  p.  517. 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         501 

has  been  given  a  seat  in  the  League  of  Nations.  The  Indian 
members,  however,  are  not  elected  by  the  people,  but  are 
simply  representatives  of  the  British  military  government 
which  rules  the  country.  The  British  crown  is  represented 
in  India  by  a  viceroy,  who,  with  the  secretary  of  state  for 
India,  a  member  of  the  British  cabinet,  has  virtually  un- 
limited power.  The  various  parliamentary  statutes  were 
consolidated  in  the  Government  of  India  Act,  passed  in 
1915,  and  amended  in  1916  and  1919.  The  last  amendment 
makes  possible  the  appointment  of  a  high  commissioner 
for  India  in  London,  as  in  the  case  of  the  self-governing 
dominions.  The  nationalist  movement  in  India  had  al- 
ready reached  formidable  proportions  before  the  outbreak 
of  the  war.  But  since  1919  it  has  become  a  movement  of 
the  masses.  The  Indians  demand,  at  the  least,  self-govern- 
ment with  full  dominion  status. 

The  composite  character  of  the  vast  country  under  the 
control  of  the  government  of  India,  which  contains  nearly 
one  fifth  of  the  human  race,  of  different  religions  and  cus- 
toms, is  advanced  as  an  argument  against  the  possibility 
of  applying  the  principle  of  self-determination  to  India. 
We  are  reminded  that  India  is  not  a  nation,  that  hundreds 
of  millions  are  in  the  deepest  ignorance,  and  that  a  large 
number  of  native  rulers  still  control  the  interior  of  the  pen- 
insula, holding  virtually  absolute  sway  over  seventy 
milhons.  The  Mohammedan  element,  numbering  more  than 
sixty  millions,  descended  from  medieval  conquerors,  is  kept 
from  oppressing  the  Hindu  majority,  and  the  native  rulers 
from  fighting  one  another,  only  by  the  presence  of  the 
British  government.  The  almost  superhuman  obstacles  to 
the  establishment  of  full  responsible  government  in  India 
are  self-evident.  If  the  nationalist  movement  signified 
only  the  unwise  and  impracticable  political  aspirations  of 
groups  of  enthusiasts  in  a  hopelessly  divided  country,  it 
would  be  no  more  than  an  interesting  internal  problem  of 
a  colonial  power  in  its  dealings  with  subject  peoples.    But 


502         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

India  is  in  a  very  real  sense  the  corner-stone  of  the  British 
Empire,  and  how  Great  Britain  faces  the  unrest  in  India 
and  what  will  be  the  outcome  are  questions  of  vital  impor- 
tance in  world  politics.  f| 

When  we  consider  that  all  the  powers  have  concentrated 
their  foreign  policies  upon  and  have  been  willing  to  fight 
wars  for  the  markets  and  concessions  and  mineral  wealth 
of  the  Chinese  and  Ottoman  empires,  and  have  made  great 
sacrifices  for  small  gains,  we  realize  what  it  means  to  Great 
Britain  to  have  undisputed  control,  from  the  international 
point  of  view,  of  the  destinies  of  India  and  the  surrounding 
countries  and  islands.  It  is  the  richest  colonial  plum  that 
the  world  has  ever  known.  One  fourth  of  the  revenues  of 
India  go  to  England  for  "home  charges,"  and  more  than 
two  thirds  are  spent  in  the  maintenance  of  a  military  estab- 
lishment that  has  been  used  to  extend  the  British  Empire 
elsewhere  in  Asia  and  in  Africa  and  to  defend  Great 
Britain's  interests  on  the  battle-fields  of  France  and  at 
Gallipoli. 

As  a  market  and  place  for  capital  investment,  India  has 
been  worth  to  Great  Britain  all  her  other  colonies  put  to- 
gether. Can  England  afford  to  allow  any  of  the  real  power 
in  Indian  affairs  to  pass  out  of  the  hands  of  British  mili- 
tary and  civilian  officials  1  Would  not  this  mean  the  end  of 
European  exploitation  in  Asia  and  of  the  economic  impe- 
rialism upon  which  the  prosperity  of  Great  Britain  is  be- 
lieved by  the  imperialists  to  rest  ? 

British  public  opinion  has  always  been  divided  upon  the 
questions  of  whether  suppression  of  the  liberties  of  other 
peoples  is  justifiable  and  whether  it  actually  pays  to  con- 
quer peoples  and  hold  them  against  their  will.  But  India 
has  seemed  so  unmistakably  a  worth-while  prize  and  has 
furnished  so  comfortable  a  living  for  a  host  of  Britishers 
that  successive  generations.  Conservative  and  Liberal,  have 
supported  the  government's  Indian  policy  even  when  there 
were  misgivings  over  the  too  logical  house-that-Jack-built 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         503 

policy  of  acquiring  the  approaches  to  India  by  land  and 
sea.  For  India's  sake  Siam,  China,  Persia,  and  Egypt  were 
despoiled,  Tibet  was  invaded,  three  wars  were  fought  with 
Afghanistan,  Russia  and  France  were  first  antagonized  and 
then  conciliated,  and  the  doctrine  of  the  integrity  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire  was  first  upheld  and  then  violated. 
Enough  of  the  colonial  ventures  were  made  to  pay  and 
proved  a  credit  to  the  Anglo-Saxon  empire-building  in- 
stinct to  offset  those  that  did  not  pay  and  that  dimmed 
English  prestige  and  honor. 

From  1906  to  1916  the  nationalist  movement  in  India, 
though  troublesome,  was  not  serious,  and  it  did  not  tax  the 
ability  and  the  wits  of  the  Indian  government.  Beginning 
with  1916,  the  agitation  for  self-government  became  serious 
because  of  the  fact  that  German  diplomacy  had  forced 
Great  Britain  into  the  position  of  fighting  Islam.  When 
the  Mohammedans  of  India,  disaffected  because  of  British 
participation  in  a  coalition  that  threatened  to  complete  the 
political  downfall  of  Mohammedan  countries,  joined  the 
Hindus  in  the  movement  for  autonomy,  British  officials  in 
India  began  to  realize  the  gravity  of  the  situation.  Eco- 
nomic and  political  concessions  were  made,  and  when  these 
did  not  satisfy,  repressive  measures  were  taken.  Along 
with  the  effort  to  maintain  unimpaired  British  authority, 
however,  the  Englishmen  at  the  head  of  Indian  affairs  did 
their  best  to  remedy  some  of  the  injustices  that  were  being 
seized  upon  by  agitators  to  move  the  Mohammedan  and 
Hindu  masses.  These  men  warned  the  British  government 
that  peace  terms  as  favorable  as  possible  had  to  be  accorded 
to  Turkey;  that  the  demands  of  Lancashire  for  a  tariff  on 
cotton  goods  prejudicial  to  the  interests  of  India  had  to 
be  rejected ;  ^  that  budget  estimates  should  be  revised  to 

*  When  the  government  of  India  raised  the  duty  on  cotton  goods  from  7^2 
per  cent,  to  11  per  cent.,  the  Lancashire  cotton  industry,  manufacturers  and 
workers  together,  sent  a  deputation  to  Secretary  Montagu  to  protest.  The 
deputation  explained  that  Lancashire  interests  were  superior  to  Indian 
interests,  and  they  demanded  the  annuhnent  of  the  increase.  Supporting 
this    position,    the    Morning    Post    said    editorially:      "The    British    Empire 


504         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

spend  less  on  the  army  and  more  on  education ;  ^  that  a 
high  commissioner  resident  in  London,  instead  of  a  mem- 
ber of  the  British  cabinet,  should  safeguard  the  interests  of 
India  in  contracts,  as  in  the  case  of  the  dominions  and 
colonies ;  and  that  Indians  should  be  allowed  to  enter  freely 
and  colonize  in  parts  of  Australia  and  Africa. 

In  part  the  good  advice  was  followed,  but  every  effort  to 
take  into  account  Indian  public  opinion  involved  offending 
other  imperial  interests.  Mr.  Lloyd  George  frankly  avowed 
on  several  occasions  that  the  varied  interests  of  the  British 
Empire  had  to  be  compromised,  as  it  was  impossible  to 
satisfy  some  without  dissatisfying  others,  and  that  this 
was  particularly  true  in  the  case  of  certain  demands  of 
his  Majesty's  Indian  subjects,  which  seemed  legitimate  to 
the  British  government,  but  which  were  rejected  by  British 
manufacturers  and  industrial  workers  and  by  public  opin- 
ion in  the  self-governing  dominions  and  colonies. 

\ATien,  before  the  end  of  1921,  it  was  realized  that  the 
Ghandi  movement  for  passive  civil  disobedience,  which  in- 
volved boycotting  English  cotton  goods  and  refusing  to 
pay  taxes,  was  spreading  alarmingly,  in  the  face  of  the 
visit  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  the  British  government  an- 
nounced its  intention  of  taking  every  measure  necessary  to 
uphold  the  authority  of  the  British  crown.  It  is  realized, 
however,  that  repression  will  fail,  and  that  the  onl}?-  way  to 
counteract  and  discredit  the  Ghandi  movement  is  for  the 
government  of  India  to  convince  the  people  that  they  are 

in  India  was  founded  for  the  good  of  the  British  trade.  .  .  .  We  do  not 
believe  in  indulging  in  beautiful  ideals  at  the  expense  of  some  millions  of 
our   fellow    Englishmen. ' ' 

^  On  May  8,  1921,  a  writer  in  the  Eangoon  Mail  said:  "To-day,  after  one 
hundred  and  fifty  years  of  British  rule,  India,  instead  of  gaining  education- 
ally, has  been  forced  to  a  far  lower  level  than  she  occupied  in  the  past. 
There  are  no  educational  facilities  whatever  in  four  out  of  every  five  villages; 
only  ten  men  in  a  hundred  and  one  woman  in  a  hundred  and  fifty  can  read  and 
write.  The  excuse  given  by  the  British  government  is  lack  of  funds.  .  .  . 
The  government  schools  have  as  their  object  the  creation  of  a  small  class 
upon  which  the  government  can  draw  for  its  supply  of  efficient,  submissive 
minor  employees.  The  Indian  student  is  taught  everything  Western  and  in 
particular  everything  English,  and  exclusively  in  the  English  language.  No 
chance  is  lost  to  impress  upon  him  the  superiority  of  the  European." 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         505 

well  off  and  that  they  are  being  justly  treated  under  British 
rule.  The  agitation  for  full  self-government  will  subside 
only  when  the  Mohammedans  are  placated  by  a  drastic 
revision  of  the  treaty  of  Sevres  ^ ;  when  Indian  tariffs  are 
adjusted  in  the  interest  of  India  and  not  of  Great  Britain ; 
and  when  the  Indian  people,  if  forced  to  bear  their  share 
of  the  burden  of  defending  and  maintaining  the  British 
Empire,  will  receive  in  return  privileges  within  the  empire 
enjoyed  by  British  subjects  of  European  origin. 

As  in  India,  the  nationalist  agitation  in  Egypt  was  con- 
fined to  a  small  class  until  the  end  of  the  World  War. 
From  1883  to  1914  the  occupation  of  Egypt  was  proclaimed 
by  British  statesmen  to  be  temporary,  and  the  outward 
forms  of  Ottoman  suzerainty  and  khedival  authority  were 
preserved.  To  the  other  powers,  as  well  as  to  the  sultan 
of  Turkey  and  to  the  Egyptian  people,  the  prime  ministers 
and  foreign  secretaries  of  Queen  Victoria  gave  solemn 
pledges  to  preserve  the  independence  of  Egypt  and  to  ter- 
minate the  occupation.  When  Turkey  declared  war  against 
Great  Britain,  the  British  government  announced  that 
Egypt  was  no  longer  a  part  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  and 
proclaimed  the  country  a  British  protectorate  for  the  dura- 
tion of  the  war.  The  khedive  was  deposed  and  his  uncle 
made  sultan.  To  the  new  sultan  King  George  sent  a  letter 
explaining  that  the  protectorate  was  simply  a  war  measure, 
and  that  the  British  government  intended  to  preserve  the 
independence  and  integrity  of  Egypt. 

The  Egyptians,  despite  their  religious  faith,  contributed 
materially  to  the  campaign  against  Turkey,  and  made  pos- 
sible, together  with  the  Arabs  of  the  Hedjaz,  the  British 
conquest  of  Palestine.     But  after  the  armistice  the  pro- 

*  The  sensational  recommendation  of  the  government  of  India  in  behalf  of 
the  Turks,  published  without  the  consent  of  the  British  cabinet  by  Secretary 
Montagu,  gives  weight  to  this  opinion.  Lloyd  George  asked  for  Montagu's 
resignation,  which  was  promptly  given.  But  Mr.  Mont-agu  on  February  15, 
1922,  made  a  vigorous  defense  in  the  House  of  Commons,  claiming  that  the 
publication  of  the  despatch  from  the  government  of  India  urging  favorable 
action  on  the  claims  of  the  Angora  Turks  was  of  vital  importance  to  the 
strengthening  of  the  tottering  British  rule  in  India. 


506         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tectorate  was  not  abolished,  and  when  the  Egyptians 
elected  a  delegation  to  go  to  the  peace  conference  at  Paris, 
its  principal  members  were  arrested  by  the  British  mili- 
tary authorities  and  deported  to  Malta.  An  uprising 
followed  in  Eg}^t,  which  was  ruthlessly  suppressed.  The 
British,  however,  were  unable  to  send  enough  troops  to 
pacify  the  country,  and  were  therefore  compelled  to  re- 
lease the  Egyptian  delegation  and  allow  it  to  proceed  to 
Paris.  But  no  attention  was  paid  to  it  there,  and  the 
British  succeeded  in  inserting  recognition  of  their  protec- 
torate over  Egypt  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles. 

Confronted  with  troubles  in  Ireland,  India,  and  Mesopo- 
tamia that  taxed  its  military  resources,  the  British  govern- 
ment was  not  in  a  position  to  enforce  acceptance  of  the 
protectorate  beyond  the  carrying  distance  of  the  rifles  of 
its  garrisons.  Lord  Milner  was  sent  out  at  the  head  of  a 
commission  to  appraise  the  strength  of  the  nationalist  sen- 
timent. The  result  was  a  recommendation  that  the  protec- 
torate be  withdrawn  and  a  treaty  negotiated  with  the 
Egyptians,  acknowledging  their  independence,  and  reserv- 
ing only  the  right  to  garrison  the  Suez  Canal,  to  control 
foreign  relations,  and  to  safeguard  the  interests  of  for- 
eigners in  Egypt.  Although  this  program  was  opposed  by 
the  extreme  nationalists,  there  was  a  reasonable  chance  of 
its  adoption.  The  British  Foreign  Office,  however,  insisted 
upon  retaining  a  certain  number  of  officials  in  Egyptian 
government  service  and  upon  maintaining  garrisons  in 
Cairo  and  other  interior  cities  and  using  Alexandria  as  a 
naval  base.  A  fresh  uprising  occurred,  and  a  great  nation- 
alist leader,  Zaglul  Pasha,  whose  deportation  to  Malta  in 
1919  had  been  the  origin  of  the  troubles,  was  arrested  and 
sent  to  Ceylon,  where  he  was  imprisoned. 

The  anomalous  situation  in  Egypt  is  one  of  the  most 
serious  of  British  imperial  problems.  It  has  revealed  the 
British  military  weakness  and  also  the  growing  impatience 
of  sober-thinking  Englishmen  at  the  thought  of  bearing  the 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         507 

cost  and  running  the  risks  of  a  military  campaign  merely 
to  satisfy  the  extreme  policies  of  the  imperialists.  Pro- 
tecting imperial  communications  through  the  canal  was  the 
justification  for  going  to  Egypt  in  the  first  place.  If  that 
privilege  be  granted  in  the  treaty,  why  should  the  govern- 
ment, refusing  the  advice  and  warning  of  Lord  Mihier,  in- 
sist upon  retaining  control  of  the  internal  affairs  of  the 
country?  The  commercial  advantages  of  controlling  Egypt 
and  the  opportunity  of  putting  several  thousand  men  on 
the  Egyptian  pay-roll  at  good  salaries  make  the  British 
occupation  worth  something.  But  the  common  people  are 
beginning  to  ask  whether  the  game  is  worth  the  candle,  i.  e., 
whether  in  actual  pounds  and  pence  the  people  of  the 
United  Kingdom  get  out  of  holding  in  subjection  a  country 
like  Egypt  a  fair  return  on  the  money  and  human  lives 
invested  in  the  enterprise.^ 

In  1921  a  great  clamor  was  raised  in  the  British  Parlia- 
ment and  press  over  the  expense  and  the  doubtful  value  of 
the  conquest  of  Mesopotamia.  It  leaked  out  that,  despite 
the  advantages  of  airplane  scouting  and  punitive  expedi- 
tions, the  British  army  had  signally  failed  to  pacify  and 
extend  its  administrative  control  over  the  Mesopotamian 
Arabs,  as  the  French  had  done  over  the  Syrians.  Between 
the  armistice  and  August,  1920,  the  British  government 
spent  $500,000,000,  and  for  1921  the  budget  asked  $300,000,- 
000  for  Mesopotamia  and  $35,000,000  for  Palestine.  Ques- 
tioned in  Parliament,  Mr.  Winston  Churchill,  the  new  colo- 
nial secretary,  confessed  that  there  was  doubt  as  to  the 
existence  of  valuable  oil-fields  in  Mesopotamia,  and  that 
the  hundred  thousand  British  troops  in  the  mandated  ter- 
ritory were  insufiicient  to  keep  the  Arabs  in  order.  And 
yet  the   United  States  had  been  protesting  against  the 

*  Following  the  example  of  granting  freedom  to  Ireland,  since  these  lines 
were  written  the  British  government  has  issued  a  proclamation  announcing 
to  the  world  that  the  king  has  made  Egj'jjt  a  free  state,  Great  Britain 
retaining  only  control  of  the  Suez  Canal  and  the  right  to  protect  Egypt 
against  any  foreign  aggression.  Sultan  Fuad  has  changed  his  title  to  melek 
(king),  and  Zaglul  Pasha  is  coming  back  from  Ceylon. 


508         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

possibility  of  not  having  a  share  in  the  region's  exploita- 
tion. The  British  tax-payer  was  called  upon  to  pay  for 
asserting  a  title  that  both  the  natives  and  a  friendly  power 
contested.  Mr,  Churchill  announced  that  the  number  of 
troops  in  Mesopotamia  was  being  reduced  and  that  the 
cabinet  was  in  favor  of  withdrawal  from  Mesopotamia. 
*'If  we  hold  the  Persian  Gulf  and  Basra,"  said  Mr. 
Churchill,  "we  have  the  key  of  the  Middle  East." 

In  1921  the  British  set  up  Emir  Feisal  as  king  of  Irak 
(Mesopotamia)  at  Bagdad,  and  Emir  Abdullah,  his  brother, 
as  king  of  Trans-Jordania.  These  two,  sons  of  King  Hus- 
sein of  the  Hedjaz,  make  no  secret  of  the  fact  that  they 
intend  to  drive  the  French  from  Syria,  smash  Zionism  in 
Palestine,  and  create  a  great  Arab  kingdom.  Many  of  the 
English  military  and  civilian  officials  in  Egypt  and  the 
mandated  territories  sympathize  with  the  Arabs,  and  this 
threatens  to  estrange  the  British  and  French  in  the  Near 
East.  As  far  as  a  survey  of  the  press  and  personal  letters 
from  friends  in  the  Near  East  are  an  indication  of  the 
attitude  of  British  officialdom  towards  the  mandates  in- 
trusted to  Great  Britain  out  of  territories  taken  from  Tur- 
key, the  opinion  seems  to  be,  "Let  us  get  out!"  As  the 
London  Times  correspondent  says:  "As  for  oil,  I  learn  on 
good  authority  that  the  opinion  of  the  experts  is  that  it 
will  be  three  years  before  it  is  known  whether  there  is  suf- 
ficient to  justify  the  projected  pipe-line  to  Haifa.  And  in 
the  meantime  the  British  cabinet  actually  proposes  to  spend 
£6,000,000  [$30,000,000]  on  repairing  its  depreciated  assets 
in  Mesopotamia's  railways.  So  long  as  we  stay,  there  will 
ever  be  a  fresh  reason  for  staying,  and  a  fresh  reason  for 
spending.    Let  us  arise  and  go." 

In  August,  1919,  it  was  announced  that  Persia  had  signed 
a  treaty  with  Great  Britain,  consenting  to  a  virtual  protec- 
torate. The  former  Russian  sphere  of  influence  was  to  be 
taken  over  by  the  British.  This  treaty  was  secured  by 
bribery  and  intimidation,  and  was  repudiated  by  the  Per- 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         509 

sians  as  soon  as  they  were  able  to  assemble  a  parliament. 
In  the  meantime,  Great  Britain  had  been  forced  to  with- 
draw from  the  Caucasus,  which  she  had  occupied  after  the 
Turkish  armistice,  and  to  sign  a  treaty  with  Afghanistan, 
renouncing  her  former  privilege  of  controlHng  foreign  rela- 
tions of  the  Kabul  government,  and  recognizing  the  com- 
plete independence  and  equality  of  Afghanistan.  On  the 
other  side  of  Persia,  the  British  were  suffering  reverses  in 
an  attempt  to  quell  a  revolt  in  Mesopotamia.  It  was  time 
to  throw  ballast  overboard.  Lord  Curzon,  in  November, 
1920,  admitted  in  the  House  of  Lords  that  the  British 
Empire  could  not  go  on  indefinitely  increasing  its  respon- 
sibility, and  that  Persia  happened  to  be  the  place  where 
the  halt  must  be  called.  Persia  was  evacuated.  The  bulk 
of  the  British  forces  in  Mesopotamia  were  withdrawn  to 
Basra,  near  the  Persian  Gulf.  The  collapse  of  the  counter- 
revolutionary movements  in  southern  Kussia  led  to  with- 
drawal from  the  Caucasus.  The  states  of  the  Caucasus  and 
Armenia  became  Bolshevist,  while  Persia  and  Afghanistan 
signed  treaties  with  soviet  Russia.  The  Anglo-Afghan 
treaty,  signed  at  Kabul  on  November  22,  1921,  guaranteed 
passage  of  munitions  to  Afghanistan  through  India,  a  stip- 
ulation that,  indirectly  at  least,  violated  the  arms  and  am- 
munition protocol  signed  at  St.  Germain  on  September  10, 
1919.1 

In  the  Near  East  the  abandonment  of  internal  adminis- 
trative control  over  Egypt  and  the  mandated  territories  of 
the  former  Ottoman  Empire  would  entail  a  similar  aban- 
donment on  the  part  of  France.  It  would  be  impossible  for 
the  French  to  maintain  themselves  by  military  means  in 
Syria  if  the  British  decided  to  abide  by  the  terms  of  article 
XXII  of  the  covenant  of  the  League  of  Nations,  and  gave 

^Article  VI,  section  3,  stipulates  "the  eastern  frontier  of  Persia  in  the 
Gulf  of  Oman."  But  gun-running  into  Afghanistan  was  aimed  at.  It  is 
manifestly  unfair  to  let  the  Afghans  receive  arms  via  India,  which  they  will 
sell  to  the  Persians  with  two  extra  commissions,  the  British  agent's  and  the 
Afghan 's. 


510         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Palestine  a  government  in  accordance  with  the  wishes  of 
the  inhabitants.  In  fact,  if  the  British  adopt  the  policy  of 
friendly  cooperation  with  Turks,  Arabs,  and  Afghans  in 
order  to  propitiate  the  Mohammedans  of  India,  the  French 
will  have  to  withdraw  from  Syria  and  the  Italians  and 
Greeks  from  Asia  Minor.  Constantinople  will  remain 
Turkish  and  the  Ottoman  Empire  will  have  a  new  lease 
of  life. 

In  the  Far  East  British  power  and  commercial  influence 
has  been  fostered  since  the  Boxer  rebellion  by  an  alliance 
with  Japan,  twice  renewed,^  and  by  agreements  with  Russia 
and  France.  The  unforeseen  situation  arising  in  China 
from  the  radical  change  of  government  in  Russia  in  1917 
seemed  to  dictate  a  fuller  understanding  with  Japan,  who 
was  falling  heir  to  the  inheritance  of  both  Germany  and 
Russia.  The  Foreign  Office,  backed  by  a  large  section  of 
public  opinion,  felt  that  the  Anglo-Japanese  alliance  should 
be  renewed  and  strengthened  in  1921.  Had  it  not  been  for 
the  intervention  of  the  self-governing  dominions  and  the 
disinclination  to  alienate  American  sympathy,  Japan  and 
Great  Britain,  in  conjunction  with  France,  would  have  ef- 
fected a  virtual  partition  of  China.  The  self-governing 
dominions,  however,  had  put  a  bar  on  Japanese  immigra- 
tion as  well  as  Indian  immigration,  even  to  the  new  man- 
dated territories,  thus  raising  a  delicate  problem  for  Brit- 
ish diplomacy  in  connection  with  Japan,  as  with  India. 
Because  London  was  a  party,  willy-nilly,  to  Asiatic  exclu- 
sion in  vast  portions  of  the  British  Empire,  the  reasonable 
gentlemen  in  Downing  Street  were  ready  to  counteract 
what  was  an  affront  to  Japan  and  an  injury  to  her  com- 
mercial and  shipping  interests  by  agreeing  to  give  Japan  a 
free  hand  in  Siberia,  Mongolia,  and  the  former  Russian 
and  German  spheres  in  China.     The  British  commercial 

*  This  alliance  terminated  automatically  with  the  exchange  of  ratifications 
of  the  four-power  treaty  negotiated  at  the  Washington  conference. 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)  511 

interests  had  everything  to  gain  by  a  compromise  with 
Japan. 

The  dominions,  however,  made  it  clear  that  the  growing 
power  of  Japan  was  a  menace,  and  that  their  policy  was 
that  the  British  Empire  should  seek  an  understanding  with 
the  United  States.  Canada  was  more  specific,  and  de- 
clared that  the  American  policy  in  regard  to  Japanese  ex- 
pansion on  the  mainland  of  Asia  and  the  open  door  was 
what  she  must  adopt  for  her  own  security  and  prosperity. 
The  treaties  agreed  upon  in  the  Washington  conference, 
especially  the  four-power  treaty,  which  superseded  the 
Anglo-Japanese  treaty,  were  the  result  of  the  influence  of 
the  dominions  in  British  foreign  policy. 

The  World  War  has  made  the  United  States  and  Japan 
trade  and  shipping  rivals  of  Great  Britain.  Competition  in 
naval  building  was  stopped  for  ten  years  by  the  Washing- 
ton conference,  but  the  economic  war  is  only  beginning. 
The  British  have  always  imported  more  than  they  have 
exported,  because  the  United  Kingdom  can  not  raise  either 
its  food-stuffs  or  its  raw  materials.  The  difference  was 
made  up  in  shipping  and  banking  profits,  interest  on  in- 
vestments abroad,  and  the  pensions  and  portions  of  sala- 
ries paid  by  subject  races  for  the  services  of  British  admin- 
istrators and  soldiers.  Self-government  naturally  lessened 
the  money  coming  in  for  salaries  and  pensions;  a  part  of 
the  banking  business  has  been  lost  to  New  York;  and  the 
surplus  profits  invested  in  the  countries  with  which  the 
United  Kingdom  trades  have  not  kept  pace  with  the  in- 
creased volume  of  trade.  In  the  Far  East  the  Japanese 
have  been  cutting  into  the  carrying  trade,  and  the  American 
Shipping  Board  has  become,  with  official  government 
backing,  a  keen  competitor  in  trans-Atlantic  and  South 
American  freight  and  passenger  business.  There  is  less 
transshipping  and  brokerage  in  British  ports,  and  now 
Queenstown  looms  up  as  a  rival  of  Liverpool  and  South- 


512         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ampton.  Marine  insurance,  like  international  banking,  has 
partly  gone  to  New  York.  How  to  win  back  the  lion 's  share 
in  the  world 's  carrying  trade  and  prevent  competitors  from 
bidding  against  them  is  a  problem  the  British  must  face 
and  solve.  For  the  profits  of  ocean  carriers  are  needed 
more  than  ever  before  to  make  up  the  adverse  balance  in 
foreign  trade. 

Important  as  the  markets  of  the  dominions,  India,  other 
colonies,  the  Near  East,  and  the  Far  East  were  to  British 
trade,  they  could  not  many  years  longer  make  up  for  loss  of 
central  and  eastern  European  markets.  Trading  with  Eus- 
sia  and  the  reestablishment  of  normal  conditions  in  Ger- 
many are  imperative  duties  of  British  foreign  policy.  In 
1921  more  than  two  million  workers  were  unemployed  in 
the  United  Kingdom.  Germany  was  the  United  Kingdom's 
best  single  customer  in  the  years  immediately  preceding 
the  World  War,  buying  slightly  more  than  the  United 
States  and  as  much  as  Australia  and  Canada  combined.  Of 
the'  products  of  certain  important  industries,  Germany 
bought,  either  for  herself  or  for  redistribution,  40  per  cent, 
of  the  British  output,  and  Germany  was,  next  to  the  United 
Kingdom,  the  best  customer  of  the  British  Empire  as  a 
whole  in  some  raw  materials  and  food-stuffs. 

Great  Britain  has  come  out  of  the  war  victor,  with  in- 
creased prestige  and  territories;  but  the  cost  to  her  tax- 
payers mounts  up  to  33  1/3  per  cent,  of  their  earnings  in 
income  tax  alone.  The  question  will  arise  as  to  whether 
the  successful  pursuit  of  a  world  policy  is  worth  while. 
It  is  a  question  that  can  not  be  answered  now.  But,  for 
the  first  time  since  steam  power  and  transportation  caused 
the  rise  of  world  powers,  we  have  the  opportunity  of  find- 
ing out  whether  a  populous  and  highly  industrialized  Euro- 
pean state  can  feed  its  population  and  make  both  ends 
meet  without  colonies,  without  any  share  in  world  politics, 
without  special  privileges  or  concessions  anywhere  in  the 
world,  and  without  merchant  shipping  protected  by  a  huge 


BRITISH  IMPERIAL  PROBLEMS  (1903-1922)         513 

navy.  The  treaty  of  Versailles  has  given  the  world  the 
opportunity  to  test  the  value  of  a  Weltpolitik.  If  Germany 
can  subsist,  and  pay  any  part  of  her  indemnities,  without 
all  the  paraphernalia  of  economic  imperialism,  is  it  neces- 
sary for  other  industrial  powers  to  have  great  navies  and 
to  maintain  by  armies  the  overlordship  of  non-European 
races,  paying  heavily  in  human  life  and  treasure,  and  con- 
stantly incurring  the  risk  of  coming  to  blows  with  other 
powers  seeking  the  same  ends  by  the  same  means? 


CHAPTER  XLV 

THE    FOREIGN    POLICY    OF    POST-BELLUM    JAPAN    (1919-1922) 

IN  answer  to  an  inquiry  from  the  secretariat  of  the 
League  of  Nations,  a  statistics  committee  reported  that 
the  wealth  of  Japan  at  the  end  of  1921  was  86,077,000,000 
yen.  The  estimate  for  1913  was  32,043,000,000  yen.  These 
figures  indicate  that  in  less  than  a  decade  the  national 
wealth  of  Japan  has  almost  tripled.  When  we  look  into 
the  categories  of  estimated  valuations,  we  find  that  lands 
are  considered  to  be  worth  more  to-day  than  the  total  na- 
tional wealth  of  1913,  but  that  this  increase  in  value  is  not 
proportionately  as  great  as  that  of  buildings  and  of  marine, 
harbor,  and  river  property.  The  most  notable  increase  is 
in  industrial  machinery.  The  population  of  Japan  proper 
increased  4,000,000  during  the  war,  and  it  is  estimated 
that  in  1922  there  are  more  than  60,000,000  Japanese  living 
in  an  area  not  much  larger  than  that  of  Great  Britain, 
w^hose  population  is  one  fourth  less. 

During  the  half -century  before  the  World  War  British 
publicists  and  economists  of  the  imperialistic  school  suc- 
ceeded in  convincing  the  British  people  that  existence,  let 
alone  prosperity,  was  dependent  upon  an  aggressive  colo- 
nial policy.  This  was  the  justification  of  heavy  taxation, 
military  burdens,  wars  of  aggression  against  Africans  and 
Asiatics,  and  the  denial  to  many  weaker  peoples  of  the 
right  to  enjoy  the  Englishman's  own  most  precious  boon 
— political  liberty.  Because  the  Japanese,  omng  to  increase 
in  population  and  multiplication  of  industries,  began 
to  feel  in  their  national  consciousness  the  same  necessity 
for  expansion  that  the  British  have  long  felt,  one  is  justi- 

614 


FOREIGN  POLICY  OF  POST-BELLUM  JAPAN       515 

fied  in  considering  the  post-bellum  foreign  policy  of  the 
Japanese  in  the  light  of  how  we  should  feel  were  we  in  their 
place.  Like  the  Germans,  the  Japanese  have  taken  as  their 
teacher  Rudyard  Kipling,  and  their  motive  for  wanting 
overseas  possessions,  a  largo  merchant  marine,  and  a  navy 
to  protect  that  marine  is  admirably  expressed  in  Kipling's 
lines : 

''Oh,  where  are  you  going  to,  all  you  Big  Steamers, 
With  England's  own  coal,  up  and  dowTi  the  salt  seas?" 

*'We  are  going  to  fetch  you  your  bread  and  your  butter, 
Your  beef,  pork,  and  mutton,  eggs,  apples,  and  cheese." 

"And  where  wdll  you  fetch  it  from,  all  you  Big  Steamers, 
And  where  shall  I  write  you  when  you  are  away?" 

*'We  fetch  it  from  Melbourne,  Quebec,  and  Vancouver — 
Address  us  at  Hobart,  Hong-Kong,  and  Bombay." 

''But  if  anything  happened  to  all  you  Big  Steamers, 
And  suppose  you  were  wrecked  up  and  down  the  salt 
sea?" 

"Then  you  'd  have  no  coffee  or  bacon  for  breakfast. 
And  you  'd  have  no  muffins  or  toast  for  your  tea. ' ' 

' '  Then  what  can  I  do  for  you,  all  you  Big  Steamers, 
Oh,  what  can  I  do  for  your  comfort  and  good?" 

"Send  out  your  big  war-ships  to  watch  your  big  waters, 
That  no  one  may  stop  us  from  bringing  you  food. 

' '  For  the  bread  that  you  eat  and  the  biscuits  you  nibble, 
The  sweets  that  you  suck  and  the  joints  that  you  carve, 

They  are  brought  to  you  daily  by  all  us  Big  Steamers — 
And  if  any  one  hinders  our  coming  you  '11  starve!" 

Next  to  Belgium  and  Holland,  Japan  is  the  most  densely 
populated  country  in  the  world.  In  comparison  with  the 
European  world  powers,  Japan  has  396  persons  per  square 
mile  against  England's  370,  Germany's  310,  Italy's  306, 
and  France 's  193.  The  population  of  the  United  States  and 
China  is  far  below  100  per  square  mile.    When  we  study 


516  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

these  figures,  we  must  take  into  consideration  the  fact  that 
the  European  peoples  are  able  to  overflow  to  their  own 
colonies  or  the  colonies  of  others,  and — until  very  recently, 
at  least — have  been  freely  admitted  to  the  United  States. 
The  habitable  parts  of  the  globe,  capable  of  an  almost 
indefinite  development  of  resources,  are  the  heritage  of 
the  white  races.  From  the  United  States,  Canada, 
Australasia,  and  South  Africa  the  Japanese,  Uke  other 
Asiatics,  are  barred.^ 

It  is  impossible  to  deal  with  the  problem  of  Japan's  inter- 
national relations  without  these  facts  in  mind.  Whatever 
may  be  our  professions  of  friendship  for  the  Japanese 
government  and  the  Japanese  people  and  their  professions 
of  friendship  for  us,  whatever  may  be  the  agreements 
signed  at  Washington  to  make  war  impossible,  we  must 
realize  the  truth  of  what  President  Wilson  said  in  his  war 
message,  on  April  2,  1917:  "Only  a  peace  between  equals 
can  last,  only  a  peace  the  very  principle  of  which  is  equality 
and  a  common  participation  in  a  common  benefit. ' '  When 
Europe  and  America  accepted  Japan  as  a  world  power,  on 
a  footing  of  equality  in  international  conferences,  they  did 
so,  not  of  their  own  initiative  and  because  of  good- will,  but 
as  a  result  of  Japan's  astonishing  ability  to  use  the  means 
of  compulsion  that  they  themselves  had  employed  in  be- 
coming world  powers.  But  the  white  race  did  not  accept, 
and  does  not  yet  propose  to  accept,  the  Japanese  people 
on  a  footing  of  equality. 

*  Australia,  with  a  greater  area  than  the  United  States,  has  scarcely  more 
than  5,000,000  inhabitants,  five  sixths  of  whom  live  in  the  southeastern  tip 
of  the  continent.  And  yet  the  Australian  premier  said  recently  that  the 
continent  could  support  100,000,000  white  people  in  their  accustomed  standard 
of  living,  and  in  this  opinion  Lord  Northcliffe,  then  visiting  Australia,  con- 
curred. New  Zealand  and  South  Africa  have  each  scarcely  more  than  a  mil- 
lion white  population,  and  the  possibilities  of  development  are  vast.  And 
yet,  these  three  dominions,  clamoring  for  immigrants  and  sorely  needing 
labor,  exclude  Asiatics.  This  is  the  greatest  problem  in  world  politics  to- 
day. By  the  most  generous  calculation  of  increase,  Europe,  if  she  directed 
all  her  immigration  towards  these  dominions,  could  scarcely  fill  their  needs 
for  a  hundred  years.  It  is  a  case,  as  the  Australian  premier  said,  of  safe- 
guarding the  patrimony  of  our  great-grandchildren.  Will  Japan  and  India 
wait  a  hundred  years? 


FOREIGN  POLICY  OF  POST-BELLUM  JAPAN       517 

Before  1914  there  was  no  other  way  for  Japan  than 
tacitly  to  acknowledge  the  exclusion  of  her  people  from  as 
yet  uncolonized  and  undeveloped  parts  of  the  earth's  sur- 
face and  from  a  share  in  the  full  colonization  and  develop- 
ment of  other  parts.  Japan  was  too  weak  to  defy  the 
European  powers  and  the  United  States;  and  she  had  the 
misfortune  of  arousing  against  herself  the  resentment  of 
her  neighbors  of  her  own  race,  because  her  first  advances  in 
imperialism  had  to  be  directed  against  them.  But  a  pro- 
found change  occurred  in  international  politics  between 
1914  and  1919,  culminating  in  the  folly  of  the  treaty  of 
Versailles  and  the  Entente  policy  towards  Russia.  Instead 
of  standing  together,  the  white  peoples  came  to  blows  over 
their  monopoly,  and  ended  by  fighting  one  another.  The 
vanquished  were  excluded,  like  the  Asiatics,  from  a  share 
in  the  world  beyond  their  frontiers. 

Then,  as  if  unaware  of  the  fatal  breach  they  had  made 
in  their  own  solid  front  against  the  other  races,  the  victors 
in  the  internecine  war  of  the  white  race  continued  to  main- 
tain the  attitude  towards  Japan  that  they  had  been  justified 
in  maintaining  when  there  was  racial  solidarity.  The 
writer  is  certain  that  he  has  not  made  too  bald  or  sweep- 
ing a  statement.  "Without  raising  this  point  an  effort  to 
explain  the  post-bellum  foreign  policy  of  Japan  would  be 
fruitless. 

As  to  objects  of  foreign  policy  the  Japanese  people  are 
united.  These  objects  are  the  result  of  the  same  desires 
that  have  created  the  objects  of  the  foreign  policy  of  the 
other  great  powers,  and  are  subject  to  criticism  and  con- 
demnation only  if  we  believe  that  the  Japanese  are  an 
inferior  race  who  have  no  right  to  aspire  to  a  gradually 
rising  standard  of  living.  It  would  be  possible  for  the 
Japanese  to  accept  their  position  vis-d-vis  the  white  man's 
world,  were  they  willing  to  abandon  any  effort  to  increase 
their  national  well-being  and  to  provide  for  their  future 
security  and  prosperity.    But  if  we  regard  the  Japanese 


518         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

as  human  beings,  with  the  same  reactions  and  ambitions  as 
ourselves,  we  shall  give  them  the  credit  of  a  foreign  policy 
that  aims  to  establish:  (1)  the  supremacy  of  Japan  in 
eastern  Asia;  (2)  the  ejection  of  the  European  powers  and 
the  United  States  from  footholds  on  the  mainland  and 
islands  of  Asia  in  close  enough  proximity  to  her  to  threaten 
her  security  or  the  interruption  of  her  maritime  commu- 
nications; (3)  the  allotment  to  Japan  of  an  equitable  share 
of  spheres  of  influence  and  colonizing  areas  by  agreement, 
or,  failing  this,  by  conquest;  and  (4)  the  insistence  upon 
the  granting  of  equality,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  that  term, 
to  Asiatics  in  their  own  continent  and  in  Africa  with 
Europeans,  or  the  expulsion  of  Europeans  from  Asia  and 
Africa  if  this  equality  be  not  granted. 

The  Japanese  are  not  given  to  boasting  about,  or  even 
discussing,  what  they  intend  to  do.  They  succeed  in  keep- 
ing their  thoughts  to  themselves,  and  are  not  aggressive 
with  mouth  or  pen,  as  are  Occidentals.  The  author  is  un- 
able to  refer  to  any  printed  page  or  speech  of  statesmen  as 
authority  for  the  four  essential  points  of  Japanese  foreign 
policy.  But  every  act  of  the  Japanese  government  in  its 
international  relations  has  tended  to  help  along  this  pro- 
gram. The  supremacy  of  Japan  in  eastern  Asia,  begun  by 
the  war  of  1894  with  China,^  has  suffered  no  setback  dur- 
ing the  last  thirty  years;  the  ejection  of  the  European 
powers,  begun  in  the  war  of  1904  with  Eussia  ^  and  con- 
tinued in  the  war  of  1914  with  Germany,^  has  progressed 
marvelously  in  eastern  Siberia  and  outer  Mongolia  since 
1918.  Japan's  demand  for  spheres  of  influence  dates  back 
to  the  aftermath  of  the  Boxer  Rebellion,  continues  through 
the  Lansing-Ishii  agreement  of  1916,  and  was  quietly  and 
firmly  pressed  at  Paris  and  Washington;  while  fear  for 
India  and  for  Indo-China  is,  in  part  at  least,  the  explana- 
tion of  the  remarkable  hold  of  the  Japanese  Foreign  Office 
upon  London  and  Paris  every  time  the  question  of  evacuat- 

^  See  Chapter  X.  '  See  Chapter  XII.  »  See  Chapter  XXVIII. 


FOKEIGN  POLICY  OF  POST-BELLUM  JAPAN       519 

ing  Siberia  and  Manchuria  has  come  up  in  international 
conferences. 

As  to  the  methods  of  attaining  these  objects  the  Japa- 
nese are  divided.  Throwing  aside  the  camouflage  of  gov- 
ernment and  opposition  parties,  of  the  Elder  Statesmen 
and  the  modernists,  of  jingos  and  anti-militarists,  we  find 
the  leaders  of  public  opinion  endeavoring  to  influence  the 
government  and  the  people  to  adopt  one  or  another  of  the 
following  means  to  the  one  end. 

A  great  many  Japanese  are  of  the  opinion  that  force  of 
arms,  which  has  been  Japan's  means  of  international  prog- 
ress so  far,  will  carry  her  steadily  along  to  the  supremacy, 
of  Asia  by  adroit  diplomacy,  punctuated  with  an  occa- 
sional war.  Japan  must  not  unnecessarily  antagonize 
Europe  or  the  United  States,  and  she  will  find  her  best 
opportunities  by  remaining  closely  allied  to  the  Entente 
powers  for  the  present,  meanwhile  keeping  her  pow- 
der dry.  This  party  is  enthusiastic  about  the  Washing- 
ton conference,  contending  that  the  five-three-three  ratio 
of  naval  strength  is  a  great  step  towards  Japanese  su- 
premacy and  relieves  the  government  of  a  heavy  financial 
burden.  By  not  tempting  fortune  for  a  number  of  years, 
Japan  will  be  ready  to  take  advantage  again  of  whatever 
situation  arises  in  the  next  European  war. 

A  great  many  other  Japanese  are  also  of  the  opinion 
that  force  of  arms  is  Japan's  sole  means  of  winning  her 
proper  place  in  the  world,  but  they  think  that  her  oppor- 
tunity lies  in  coming  to  an  understanding  with  Russia  and 
Germany,  so  that  when  the  next  war  arises  she  ^^dll  be  able 
to  strike  the  British  and  French  in  the  Far  East.  This 
party  sees  in  the  present  condition  of  Europe  a  unique 
opportunity  to  use  the  powers  Japan  has  already  ousted 
from  the  Far  East  to  help  her  get  rid  of  the  others. 

A  great  many  other  Japanese  are  also  of  the  opinion 
that  force  of  arms  is  the  one  argument  of  world  politics, 
but  they  have  no  faith  in  the  advancement  of  Japan's 


520         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

objects  by  alliance  and  cooperation  with  any  European 
power.  They  declare  that  despite  surface  indications  the 
white  race  will  stand  together  in  a  pinch,  asserting  for 
instance  that  Germany  or  Russia,  like  Great  Britain  or 
France,  would  go  to  the  aid  of  the  United  States  in  a 
Japanese-American  war.  This  party  bitterly  opposes  the 
imperialistic  policy  of  Japan  towards  China,  and  advocates 
autonomy,  if  not  independence,  for  Korea.  It  sees  in  the 
rapprochement  of  China  and  Japan  the  irresistible  means 
of  expelling  all  European  powers  and  preaches  the  gospel 
of  Asia  for  the  Asiatics  by  the  Asiatics.  Its  emissaries  are 
Avorking  hard  in  Korea  and  China,  and  are  beginning  prop- 
aganda in  Indo-China  and  India.  They  have  condemned 
their  own  government  for  its  actions  in  Korea,  denounced 
the  twenty-one  demands,  advocated  the  restitution  of  Shan- 
tung, and  represented  themselves  as  anti-imperialists  and 
liberals,  ready  to  encourage  the  aspirations  of  all  subject 
and  downtrodden  peoples. 

The  anti-militarist  movement  in  Japan,  of  which  much 
has  been  written  since  Germany's  downfall,  is  not  fairly 
jDresented  to  European  and  American  readers.  It  stands 
to  reason  that  the  Japanese  are  not  more  peace-loving  than 
ourselves.  We  are  anti-militarists  and  even  pacifists,  but 
with  reservations.  "We  want  a  fair  share  of  prosperity  for 
ourselves  and  assurances  that  our  children  will  be  secure 
and  prosperous.  But  if  we  are  given  no  bone  when  bones 
are  being  handed  around,  or  when  some  other  dog  tries  to 
take  ours,  we  are  ready  for  a  fight.  The  Japanese  move- 
ment against  militarism  and  for  harmonious  relations  with 
other  nations  is  predicated  upon  the  assumption  that 
Europe  and  America  intend  to  treat  Japan  fairly  and  rec- 
ognize that  she  has  the  same  needs,  and  the  same  right  to 
provide  for  them,  that  we  have.  The  success  of  the  anti- 
mihtarist  movement  in  Japan  depends  upon  developments 
outside  Japan.  Similarly,  the  English-speaking  branches 
of  the  white  race,  by  their  policy  in  regard  to  Japanese 


FOREIGN  POLICY  OF  POST-BELLUM  JAPAN       521 

political  and  economic  expansion,  will  determine  whether 
we  shall  soon  have  another  world  war.  They  can  not  main- 
tain a  monopoly  of  the  world's  colonizing  areas  and  raw 
materials  without  having  to  fight  one  of  three  combina- 
tions, i.  e.,  (1)  Japan  and  the  Latin-European  countries; 
(2)  Japan,  Germany,  and  Russia;  or  (3)  Japan  and  China. 


CHAPTER  XL VI 

THE  PLACE  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  W0RLD 
(1920-1922) 

THE  rise  of  the  United  States  as  a  world  power  has 
been  sudden  and  accidental,  in  contrast  with  the  slow 
and  deliberate  extension  of  the  economic  influence  and  the 
political  sovereignty  of  the  European  powers.  The  Span- 
ish-American War  was  caused  by  domestic  considerations,^ 
and  none  realized  that  it  was  going  to  involve  us  in  world 
affairs.  Without  intending  it  we  became  a  colonial  power 
in  the  Pacific  and  were  compelled  to  play  a  role  in  inter- 
national diplomacy  in  the  Far  East.  We  did  our  best  to 
keep  out  of  the  European  war,  and,  during  the  four  years 
since  the  armistice,  we  have  avoided  assuming  responsibili- 
ties in  the  Near  East  and  have  refused  to  enter  into  alli- 
ances with  European  powers  for  the  purpose  of  guarantee- 
ing the  new  European  order  established  by  the  Paris 
treaties.  But,  willy-nilly,  the  American  people  are  forced 
to  recognize  that  the  political  as  well  as  the  economic  equi- 
librium of  the  world  depends  upon  the  policies  adopted  by 
the  United  States. 

The  place  of  the  United  States  in  the  world  and  her  pre- 
ponderant position  in  international  affairs  are  the  result 
of  a  natural  growth  in  population  and  wealth,  which  has 
rapidly  changed  the  relative  position  of  the  American  peo- 
ple among  the  peoples  of  European  origin.  A  hundred 
years  ago,  during  the  period  of  reconstruction  following 
the  Napoleonic  wars,  we  were  a  small  nation,  with  unde- 
veloped resources,  and,  although  we  grew  rapidly  each 
decade  in  population,  the  internal  development  of  our  own 

» See  pp.  343-344. 

622 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD      523 

country  more  than  consumed  our  surplus,  and  we  had  to 
seek  liquid  capital  in  Europe.  We  had  no  part  in  the 
extension  of  the  white  race's  political  sovereignty  over 
Asia  and  Africa,  in  its  colonization  of  Australasia  and  parts 
of  Africa,  and  in  the  marvelous  development  of  interna- 
tional trade.  Even  on  our  own  hemisphere  we  had  few 
investments  in  foreign  countries  and  traded  very  little 
with  Latin  America.  But  the  decades  preceding  the 
"World  War  saw  us  pass  in  population  all  the  European 
nations  except  Russia,  and  between  1914  and  1920  we  were 
transformed  from  a  debtor  to  a  creditor  nation,  with  the 
other  great  powers  owing  us  huge  sums  of  money.  Our 
intervention  in  the  World  War  decided  the  issue  in  favor 
of  the  Entente  powers,  and  brought  into  the  conflict  with 
the  German  coalition  China,  Siam,  and  the  majority  of  the 
Latin- American  states. 

A  review  of  the  increase  in  population  tells  the  story  of 
the  change  of  our  position  vis-d-vis  the  other  powers : 


IMMIGRANTS 

ENTERING  U.  S. 

YEAE 

POPULATION 

IN  PRECEDING 
DECADE 

1820 
1830 
1840 

9,638,453 
12,860,692 
17,063,353 

250,000  (est.) 

143,439 

599,125 

1850 

23,191,876 

1,713,251 

1860 
1870 
1880 

31,443,321 

38,558,371 
50,155,783 

2,598,214 
2,314,824 
2,812,191 

1890 

62,947,714 

5,246,613 

1900 
1910 
1920 

75,994,575 

91,972,266 

105,710,620 

3,844,420 
7,753,816 
6,100,000 

Of  the  34,000,000  immigrants  added  to  the  United  States 
by  immigration,  considerably  less  than  a  million  have  come 
from  Asia,  and  only  half  a  million  from  France.  Ger- 
many, the  United  Kingdom,  Ireland,  Italy,  Austria-Hun- 
gary, Russia,  and  the  Scandinavian  countries  have  fur- 
nished the  largest  elements,  ranging  from  five  and  a  half 
to  two  millions.  It  is  interesting  to  note,  however,  that 
..the  northern  European  immigration  has  declined  appre- 


624         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

ciably  since  1890,  and  that  the  bulk  of  the  immigration 
during  the  last  thirty  years  has  come  from  eastern,  south- 
eastern, and  southern  Europe.  In  the  years  immediately 
preceding  the  World  War  Italy,  Austria-Hungary,  and 
Russia  furnished  more  than  three  fourths  of  the  total  im- 
migration. 

Chinese  exclusion  laws  became  operative  forty  years  ago, 
and  the  more  delicate  problem  of  excluding  Japanese  has 
been  adjusted  temporarily  from  time  to  time  by  a  ' '  gentle- 
man's  agreement."  But  until  after  the  World  War  no 
laws  Avere  enacted  curtailing  the  volume  of  immigration 
from  Europe.  In  1921  Congress  passed  a  temporary  re- 
striction bill,  fixing  at  three  per  cent,  of  the  number  of  im- 
migrants already  in  the  country  the  annual  quota  to  be 
admitted  from  each  European  state.  A  strong  current  of 
opinion  is  making  itself  felt  at  Washington  to  suspend 
entirely  for  from  three  to  five  years  the  privilege  of  entry 
into  the  United  States  of  those  who  come  avowedly  to  make 
the  New  World  their  treasure-trove  or  permanent  home 
We  need  a  breathing-spell  to  assimilate  the  foreigners 
already  in  our  midst;  a  great  wave  of  undesirable  immi- 
gration is  feared;  and  A\T.despread  unemployment  makes 
it  inadvisable  to  add  to  the  number  of  unskilled  laborers 
seeking  jobs. 

But  even  if  we  have  little  or  no  immigration  during  the 
years  immediately  ahead,  or  if  we  decide  upon  a  definite 
policy  of  limitation  by  constitutional  amendment,^  the  im- 
migration from  Europe  of  the  past  century — and  espe- 
cially of  the  past  thirty  years — has  established  for  the 
United  States  a  unique  and  unalterable  place  among  the 
nations  of  the  world.  Our  place  is  unique  and  unalterable 
owing  to  the  fact  that  by  natural  increase  alone  and  by 
reason  of  the  actual  and  potential  wealth  within  our  own 

*  From  the  temper  of  Congress,  reflecting  the  opinion  of  the  country, 
it  is  reasonable  to  suppose  that  restriction  of  immigration  will  soon  become 
a  great  national  issue,  and  that  the  settlement  of  the  problem  will  be  reached 
by  a  constitutional  amendment. 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD       525 

borders  we  are  bound  to  become  and  remain  for  a  long 
time  the  most  numerous  and  most  wealthy  of  white  peo- 
ples. Immigration  accomplished  this.  But  immigration 
accomplished  also  a  radical  transformation  in  the  racial 
and  cultural  character  of  the  American  people  to  such  an 
extent  that  when  we  finally  entered  the  field  of  world  poli- 
tics we  were  without  a  national  consciousness  of  our  own 
and  at  the  same  time  without  an  irresistible  affinity  of 
blood  or  culture  for  any  one  European  people.  No  one 
group  or  element  of  our  population  is  now,  or  is  Hkely  to 
be  in  the  future,  strong  enough  to  commit  the  United  States 
to  a  foreign  pohcy  supporting  one  power  or  a  coalition  of 
powers  against  any  other  or  others.  Changing  circum- 
stances might  have  led  us  into  a  political  alliance  with  one 
or  more  European  powers,  had  we  not  received  a  con- 
tinual and  abundant  infusion  of  new  blood  from  every  part 
of  Europe.  But  the  American  people  are  too  pan-Euro- 
pean now  to  make  possible  the  abandonment  of  Washing- 
ton's farewell  advice. 

There  are  no  opponents  to  the  policy  of  keeping  the 
United  States  a  white  man's  country.  While  it  is  impos- 
sible for  our  government  to  discriminate  in  favor  of  any 
European  country,  it  is  equally  impossible  to  modify  the 
existing  regulations  and  agreements  for  the  exclusion  of 
Asiatics.  But  there  are  some  Americans  w^ho  believe  that 
our  foreign  policy,  in  dealing  mth  the  question  of  Asiatic 
inmiigration,  must  bring  us  into  line  mth  the  self-govern- 
ing dominions  of  Great  Britain  in  a  common  exclusion 
agreement.  Said  Senator  Lodge,  a  few  weeks  after  the 
election  of  President  Harding: 

''There  is  one  arrangement  I  should  like  to  make  very 
much,  and  that  is  an  arrangement  with  Canada,  Australia, 
and  New  Zealand  in  regard  to  Asiatic  immigration.  Their 
danger  is  the  same  as  ours,  and  the  shadow  hangs  darkest 
over  Australia.  We  must  face  it,  and  it  might  as  well  be 
understood  that  it  is  in  no  sense  of  hostility  to  any  nation, 


526         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

but  there  are  certain  great  principles  that  must  be  ac- 
cepted. One  is  that  no  nation  has  the  right  or  can  find  a 
cause  of  war  in  the  demand  that  her  people  shall  migrate 
to  another  free  country,  as  the  first  sovereign  right  is  the 
right  to  say  who  shall  come  into  the  country. ' '  ^ 

As  chairman  of  the  Senate  Foreign  Relations  Commit- 
tee, Senator  Lodge  speaks  with  authority,  and  it  is  neces- 
sary to  draw  attention  to  the  import  of  his  words.  We 
have  already  discussed  the  problem  of  Jaj^an's  attitude 
towards  the  exclusion  of  Asiatics  from  Australia  and  New 
Zealand,  and  have  pointed  out  how  this  is  bound  to  become 
a  great  issue  in  world  politics,  affe_cting  the  future  of  Euro- 
pean relations  with  India  as  well  as  with  the  Far  East.^ 
It  will  be  generally  admitted  that  there  is  a  solidarity  of 
interest  between  the  United  States  and  Canada  in  the  mat- 
ter of  mutually  supporting  the  policy  of  excluding  Asiatics. 
But  the  Ltnited  States — and  Canada  as  well — some  day 
mil  have  to  face  the  alternatives  of  supporting  the  thesis 
that  Australasia  is  a  white  man's  land  or  of  refusing  to 
oppose  the  logical  expansion  of  Japan.  Sentimental  rea- 
sons wouM  dictate  the  choice  of  the  first ;  but  whether  the 
second  is  not  the  wiser  choice  and  the  choice  indicated  by 
the  interests  of  the  peoples  of  the  western  hemisphere  is 
an  open  question.  We  are  confronted  with  the  same  prob- 
lem in  regard  to  Japanese  expansion  in  eastern  Asia  and 
the  islands  off  the  coast  of  the  Asiatic  continent.  Euro- 
pean and  American  sovereignty  has  been  extended  to  that 
part  of  the  world  because  of  the  need  of  the  European 
and  American  peoples  for  colonizing  areas  and  markets. 
Now  that  Japan,  following  Occidental  economic  evolution, 
has  become  an  industrial  nation,  are  we  going  to  hem  her 
in,  prevent  her  growth,  attempt  to  destroy  her,  or  are  we 

*  Speaking  at  the  Union  League,  Philadelphia,  November  28,  1920.  Upon 
this  principle  the  inhabitants  of  Palestine  base  their  right  to  oppose  Zionism, 
and  the  British  government  is  beginning  to  see  the  unwisdom,  as  well  as 
the  injustice  and  inconsistency,  of  forcing  the  Palestinians  to  accept  immi- 
grants from  Europe  whose  avowed  object  is  to  get  political  control  of  the 
country. 

'  See  pp.  516-517. 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD       527 

going  to  acknowledge  her  right  to  a  share  in  the  world 
beyond   her   frontiers  1 

Instinctively  the  American  people  are  ready  to  under- 
write the  status  quo  in  Canada,  and  to  consider  that  our 
national  interests  arc  affected  by  any  changes  or  upsets  in 
any  part  of  North  or  South  America.  But  they  will  not 
intervene  in  the  political  affairs  of  Europe,  and  if  we  are 
asked  to  defend  the  title  of  European  nations  to  their  pos- 
sessions in  other  parts  of  the  world,  questions  immediately 
arise  with  which  only  those  who  are  versed  in  practical 
world  politics  are  competent  to  deal.  For  we  must  satisfy 
ourselves  that  the  status  quo  we  are  called  upon  to  defend, 
at  the  risk  of  another  bloody  and  costly  war,  is  advanta- 
geous to  the  present  and  future  interests  of  the  United 
States. 

In  tracing  the  motives  and  the  results  of  the  expansion 
of  European  nations  overseas  we  have  realized  how  each 
of  these  nations  has  endeavored  to  establish  exclusive 
rights  of  exploitation,  how  they  have  come  into  conflict 
with  one  another  by  trying  to  check  one  another's  expan- 
sion, how  they  have  avoided  wars  by  bargaining  and  ar- 
ranging spheres  of  influence,  and  how  Japan's  recent  his- 
tory is  simply  an  imitation  in  self-defense  of  the  foreign 
policies  of  European  countries.  Do  ut  des  (I  give  that  you 
may  give)  has  been  the  principle  of  diplomacy  where  it  was 
impossible  or  was  deemed  inexpedient  or  too  costly  to  re- 
sort to  force.  Conquest,  or  failing  that  bargaining,  has 
made  the  political  status  quo  in  Asia  and  Africa.  To 
weak  peoples  and  to  peoples  conquered  in  war  this  status 
quo  is  disadvantageous,  because  it  places  the  commerce 
and  capital  and  shipping  of  these  peoples  in  a  position  of 
inferiority  in  world  trade. 

In  so  far  as  world  trade  is  concerned,  the  United  States 
is  in  the  same  position  of  inferiority  as  weak  nations  and 
is  almost  as  badly  off  as  the  nations  that  were  compelled 
to  sign  the  Paris  treaties.    It  is  simply  because  we  have  not 


528         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

set  store  upon  overseas  trade  and  investments  and  have 
not  had  a  large  merchant  marine  that  we  have  not  felt 
the  pinch  of  the  hold  of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Japan 
upon  the  Far  East,  and  of  the  two  former  powers  upon 
the  Near  East  and  Africa — a  hold  that  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  the  San  Kemo  conference,  and  the  treaties  of 
the  Washington  conference  immeasurably  strengthened.^ 
American  goods  are  discriminated  against  in  Manchuria 
and  other  parts  of  China,  in  Indo- China,  and,  in  fact,  in 
every  part  of  the  world  where  the  flags  of  the  European 
nations  fly;  and  the  same  handicap  is  felt  by  American 
steamship  lines  and  American  capital  seeking  investment. 
Numerous  instances  have  arisen  since  the  World  War  to 
prove  that  the  Entente  powers  and  Japan  have  felt  no 
sense  of  obligation  towards  the  United  States  in  their  ar- 
rangements to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  the  victory  over  Ger- 
many, and  our  State  Department  has  protested  on  several 
occasions  against  the  tendency  to  exclude  American  citi- 
zens from  a  share  in  the  spoils.  We  have  space  only  to 
enumerate  some  concrete  illustrations  of  discrimination: 
ignoring  American  interests  and  claims  in  the  allotment  of 
cables  surrendered  by  Germany,  and  in  the  distribution  of 
mandates  (island  of  Yap) ;  refusal  of  British  and  French 
governments  to  grant  American  companies  equal  opportu- 
nities for  oil  prospecting  and  development  in  Mesopotamia 
with  those  granted  to  British  and  French  companies  (Colby 
and  Hughes  notes  of  protest) ;  throwing  out  by  Alexandria 
Chamber  of  Commerce,  controlled  by  Englishmen,  of  the 
lowest  bids  for  transport  of  Egyptian  cotton  to  the  United 
States,  and  the  insistence  that  this  cotton  be  transported 
in  British  bottoms  or  at  least  be  transshipped  by  way  of 
Liverpool  (protest  of  United  States  Shipping  Board) ;  in- 

^  See  pp.  550-551.  If  the  American  student  desires  to  get  a  graphic  picture 
of  what  these  advantages  are,  let  him  go  through  the  treaties,  keeping  in 
mind  that  the  status  quo  of  1914  was  already  exceedingly  advantageous  to 
the  powers  who  were  the  exclusive  beneficiaries  of  the  1919  and  1920  treaties 
and  agreements. 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD      529 

terference  of  British  and  French  High  Commissions  in 
Constantinople  with  American  efforts  to  get  trade  and 
unfair  discrimination  in  favor  of  their  own  nationals,  under 
guise  of  military  necessity  (protest  of  American  Chamber 
of  Commerce  for  the  Levant) ;  the  effort  of  Great  Britain 
to  get  exclusive  control  of  the  resources  of  Persia  (Anglo- 
Persian  agreement  of  Teheran,  August,  1919,  against  which 
the  American  government  formally  protested) ;  the  cam- 
paign in  the  French  press  to  erect  against  other  powers 
than  France  the  same  tariffs  that  hold  in  French  colo- 
nies; and  the  propaganda  in  Great  Britain  for  imperial 
preferential  tariffs  in  other  than  self-governing  dominions 
(already  begun  in  the  1918  Indian  export  duties). 

The  reader  who  has  followed  the  story  of  world  politics 
through  this  book  will  realize  how  these  discriminations 
fall  upon  the  United  States  in  the  way  that  they  fall  upon 
weak  and  dispossessed  nations.  Great  Britain  and  France 
and  Eussia  in  the  past  made  mutual  concessions  to  one 
another ;  Great  Britain  and  Japan  did  the  same ;  after  the 
opening  of  the  World  War  Italy  was  received  into  the 
Entente  Alliance  with  definite  advantages  and  rewards 
promised  her;  and  now,  when  Eussia  recovers  her  power, 
she  will  be  able  to  get  back  many  of  her  old  exclusive  rights 
beyond  her  European  frontiers,  and  force  the  Entente 
powers  to  revise  their  post-bellum  agreements  and  let  her 
in  on  the  Near  Eastern  spoils  of  war.  Each  of  these  powers 
is  compensated  for  what  the  other  four  enjoy;  and  they 
have  a  common  interest  in  preventing  Germany  from  re- 
covering her  colonies  and  her  former  commercial  position 
outside  Europe.  Their  present  policy  towards  Germany  is 
influenced  by  their  ability  to  bargain  with  one  another  in 
African  and  Asiatic  territories  and  spheres  of  influence.* 

The  United  States  is  assured  by  her  European  comrades- 
in-arms  that  the  enemies  of  Germany  fought  for  a  common 
cause,  won  a  common  victory,  and  are  equally  interested 

*See  pp.  549-550. 


530         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

in  enforcement  of  the  treaties.  But  the  principle  of  com- 
munity in  ideals  and  sacrifices  and  burdens  in  time  of 
peace  does  not  extend  to  community  in  the  fruits  of  victory. 
Not  only  did  the  Entente  powers  divide  among  themselves 
the  mandates  for  the  German  colonies  and  the  territories 
liberated  from  the  Ottoman  Empire,  but  they  also  left  the 
United  Statfes  out  of  the  reckoning  in  the  apportionment  of 
the  indemnity  to  be  exacted.  They  went  so  far  as  to  con- 
test the  right  of  the  United  States  to  hold  the  ships  and  to 
retain  the  other  property  she  had  seized  from  enemy  na- 
tionals. 

Despite  our  refusal  to  enter  the  League  of  Nations  and 
to  make  ourselves  responsible  for  the  execution  of  the 
Paris  treaties,  we  are  still  importuned  to  undertake  respon- 
sibilities and  to  enter  into  commitments  that  tend  to  make 
us  accept  as  permament  and  even  to  pledge  us  to  defend  a 
world-wide  political  and  economic  status  quo  that  is  de- 
cidedly to  our  disadvantage  if  we  intend  to  or  feel  that  we 
need  to  play  the  role  of  a  world  power. 

"We  have  been  disappointed  in  the  realization  of  our 
ideals ;  we  are  too  divided  in  blood  and  cultural  background 
to  cooperate  with  certain  European  nations  to  further  their 
interests  against  the  interests  of  others  because  of  kinship, 
affection,  or  admiration;  and,  as  a  nation,  we  are  not 
yet  interested  enough  in  foreign  trade  to  believe  that  our 
prosperity  is  dependent  upon  an  aggressive  foreign  policy 
aimed  at  throwing  open  the  doors  closed  against  us  and 
removing  the  discriminations  and  inequalities  handicapping 
American  goods,  capital,  and  shipping  in  Africa  and  Asia. 

The  events  of  the  past  four  years  in  international  poli- 
tics have  strongly  influenced  the  American  people  against 
the  policy  of  political  cooperation  with  other  nations  in 
settling  the  affairs  of  the  world.  When  he  refused  the 
invitation  to  participate  in  the  Genoa  conference,  President 
Harding  proved  himself  a  correct  interpreter  of  American 
public  opinion.    And  there  is  not  much  chance  of  a  change 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD       531 

in  the  attitude  of  tlie  United  States  towards  the  rest  of 
the  world  until  the  American  people  begin  to  compete  with 
other  nations  for  world  trade,  with  the  feeling  that  their 
well-being  depends  upon  getting  a  good  share,  or  until,  by 
the  initiative  of  other  nations,  we  are  persuaded  to  aban- 
don our  policy  of  aloofness  and  indifference.  Let  us  exam- 
ine these  two  contingencies. 

The  war  in  Europe  created  an  unprecedented  demand 
for  American  manufactured  and  agricultural  products  and 
seemingly  brought  unprecedented  prosperity  to  the  Ameri- 
can people.  In  addition  to  supplying  the  European  markets 
with  war  materials  and  with  food-stuffs  and  manufactured 
articles,  we  found  a  demand  for  American  goods  in  South 
American  and  colonial  markets.  But  the  conditions  that 
created  this  export  trade  were  artificial,  and  the  prosperity 
was  artificial.  Europe  bought  from  us  because  of  her  des- 
perate need  and  because  her  energies  were  devoted  to  fight- 
ing; the  other  continents  bought  from  us  because  we  did 
not  have  the  competition  of  European  goods.  After  the 
war  was  over  we  discovered  that  a  good  part  of  our  exports 
was  paid  for  with  money  our  government  had  loaned  the 
borrowers,  or  was  sold  on  credit.  Most  of  what  we  sup- 
posedly earned  during  the  war  was  our  own  money,  sub- 
scribed to  the  successive  American  Liberty  Loans  or  to 
loans  of  foreign  governments  offered  in  the  United  States 
through  American  banks.  Since  the  latter  part  of  1919 
the  high  price  of  the  dollar  has  militated  againsf  American 
foreign  trade.  But,  even  if  exchange  were  normal,  could 
we  sell  extensively  in  world  markets  in  competition  with 
the  European  powers  and  Japan,  and  would  it  be  worth 
our  while  to  do  so  1  If  we  limit  immigration,  is  it  probable 
that  for  many  years  to  come  American  producers  as  a 
whole  will  regard  overseas  markets  as  profitable?  Many 
competent  students  of  American  economic  life  are  of  the 
opinion  that  through  supplying  domestic  markets  we  shall 
see  during  the  next  thirty  years  a  return  to  the  prosperity 


532         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

that  this  country  experienced  in  the  generation  after  the 
Civil  War.  It  is  hard  to  dissent  from  this  opinion  and 
to  controvert  it,  especially  when  one  realizes  that  the  in- 
stinctive orientation  of  the  American  people  is  towards  a 
new  period  of  intensive  internal  development. 

Some  American  capitalists  and  manufacturers  and 
bankers  care  very  much  about  foreign  trade,  and  have  car- 
ried on  a  powerful  propaganda  to  create  an  appetite  for  it 
and  to  inform  business  men  of  the  patent  reasons  for  our 
lack  of  success  in  capturing  and  holding  a  share  of  it. 
Much  has  been  written  on  the  necessity  of  controlling  cables, 
extending  long  credits,  having  our  own  merchant  marine, 
investing  money  in  the  countries  in  which  we  plan  to  de- 
velop markets,  opening  branches  of  American  banks,  send- 
ing out  bona  fide  Americans  to  represent  American  inter- 
ests, learning  foreign  languages,  adapting  our  goods  and 
our  weights  and  measures  to  the  markets  in  which  we  intend 
to  sell,  improving  our  consular  service,  and  getting  the 
State  Department  and  our  diplomatic  representatives  be- 
hind American  trade  in  the  way  that  the  machinery  of 
other  governments  stands  behind  the  trade  of  their  na- 
tionals. But  the  great  mass  of  Americans  do  not  care 
enough  about  foreign  trade  to  go  after  it  in  the  European 
way,  and  do  not  believe  that  the  returns  will  compensate 
for  the  abandonment  by  our  government  of  its  traditional 
policies  for  the  policies  that  have  brought  the  European 
nations  and  Japan  at  one  another's  throats. 

Because  we  do  not  feel  ourselves  dependent  upon  and 
therefore  are  not  worrying  about  world  markets,  the  in- 
sistence of  the  United  States  upon  the  open  door  in  China 
and  upon  equal  opportunities  for  American  trade  and  in- 
vestment elsewhere  has  been  purely  academic.  We  have 
made  no  threats;  and  we  have  esteemed  the  privileges  of 
too  slight  value  to  assume  responsibilities  in  order  to  make 
good  our  claim  to  them.  This  fact  is  seen  in  our  attitude 
towards  the  question  of  mandates.    We  have  not  wanted 


PLACE  OF  UNITED  STATES  IN  THE  WORLD      533 

to  add  to  our  responsibilities.  On  the  contrary,  most 
Americans  are  willing  even  to  give  up  a  great  possession 
already  acquired,  like  the  Philippine  Islands.  Suggestions 
that  the  United  States  liquidate  in  part  or  in  whole  the 
Allied  indebtedness  by  taking  over  the  British  and  French 
possessions  in  the  West  Indies  and  in  South  America,  or 
by  acquiring  title  to  Near  Eastern  countries  and  the  Ger- 
man colonies,  in  regard  to  which  the  mandate  scheme  does 
not  seem  to  be  working,  receives  little  attention  in  the 
American  press. ^  World  power,  in  terms  of  economic  im- 
perialism or  bearing  the  white  man's  burden,  does  not 
tempt  the  American  people  enough  to  induce  them  to  set 
a  price  upon  their  cooperation  with  other  nations  in  man- 
aging the  world. 

But  if  we  were  persistently  and  ardently  wooed  our  in- 
terest could  be  aroused.  One  might  not  value  a  thing 
enough  to  fight  for  it  or  even  to  ask  for  it,  but  he  would 
probably  not  refuse  it  if  it  were  offered  him.  The  power 
and  the  self-sufficiency  of  the  United  States  are  factors 
in  the  international  situation  that  the  Entente  powers 
would  do  well  to  consider  as  Siamese  twins.  It  may  be 
sound  doctrine  for  them  to  preach  that  we  need  their  friend- 
ship and  cooperation  as  much  as  they  need  ours,  and  that 
our  well-being  is  dependent  upon  their  economic  rehabili- 
tation and  political  ascendancy.  But  American  public 
opinion  will  not  accept  it.  Those  who  seek  our  aid  must 
make  sacrifices  to  obtain  it.  The  time  never  was  when  we 
were  influenced  by  the  argument  that  they  were  fighting  our 
battle  for  us,  although  it  might  have  been,  had  the  right 
kind  of  a  peace  crowned  the  victory  over  Germany.  The 
American  people  are  deaf  to  the  two  pleas  most  commonly 
advanced  for  a  close  understanding  and  cooperation  with 
the  Entente  powers,  that  we  should  be  defending  civiliza- 

*  Or  in  Congress.  In  fact,  the  advocates  of  an  exchange  of  this  sort  have 
been  laughed  at  more  than  once.  Senator  France's  scheme  for  taking  over 
the  German  African  colonies  was  ridiculed  in  the  Senate,  and  was  the  sub- 
ject for  many  quips  in  the  press. 


534         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tion  and  that  we  should  be  advancing  our  own  interests. 
The  way  the  victory  over  Germany  has  been  used  makes  us 
doubt,  rightly  or  wrongly,  the  former;  and  our  common 
sense,  after  studying  the  play  of  world  politics  during  the 
years  that  followed  the  armistices,  has  caused  us  to  ques- 
tion whether  the  maintenance  of  the  world-wide  status  quo 
conforms  with  our  interests,  or  at  least  whether  we  should 
be  justified  in  committing  ourselves  to  any  financial  or 
military  burdens  in  upholding  the  arrangements  of  the 
Paris  treaties. 

The  place  of  the  United  States  in  the  world  is  that  of 
the  strongest  of  the  powers,  whose  potential  supremacy  is 
not  recognized  by  the  other  powers  and  is  not  yet  a  danger 
because  it  is  not  yet  an  ambition.  Because  of  the  composi- 
tion of  her  people  the  United  States  can  not  be  reckoned 
upon  to  take  sides  in  any  European  quarrel  or  to  support 
the  domination  of  one  European  people  over  another.  Be- 
cause of  the  resources  still  undeveloped  within  her  own 
frontiers,  the  United  States  has  not  entered  into  world 
politics  as  a  struggle  for  existence  or  as  a  means  of  attain- 
ing and  maintaining  prosperity.  Because  of  her  geographi- 
cal position  and  population,  national  security  is  not  one  of 
her  problems  in  international  relations.  By  the  initiative 
and  skilful  diplomacy  of  other  powers  she  may  be  led  into 
extending  her  colonial  responsibilities  and  into  backing  her 
own  race  against  the  yellow  race.  But  of  her  own  initiative 
it  is  not  probable  that  she  will  acquire  new  colonies,  or  that 
she  will  assume  the  championship  of  European  supremacy 
in  the  Far  East  and  the  Pacific. 


CHAPTER  XLVII 

BASES   or   SOLIDAEITY    AMONG   ENGLISH-SPEAKING   NATIONS 

(1922) 

NONE  denies  that  the  world  is  askew.  Ships  of  state 
are  pilotless  and  rudderless,  riding  God  knows 
whither.  In  every  country  internal  economic  and  social 
conditions  are  so  upset  that  forecasts  of  the  morrow  seem 
futile.  And  yet,  international  political  relationships  de- 
pend upon  these  internal  conditions  more  intimately  and 
more  entirely  than  ever  before  in  history.  Statesmen  are 
still  sitting  at  the  diplomatic  chessboard,  making  moves  in 
accordance  with  the  old  rules  of  the  game.  But  each  reaUzes 
that  shaping  the  foreign  policy  of  his  nation  is  no  longer 
independent  of  or  divorced  from  home  policies  and  prob- 
lems. The  old  order  upon  which  one  could  count  in  direct- 
ing foreign  affairs  has  given  place  to  new  and  uncertain 
values.  Just  what  the  changes  are,  whether  for  good  or 
bad,  whether  permanent  or  temporary,  and  how  we  are  to 
adjust  ourselves  to  them  and  take  advantage  of  them  or 
combat  them,  as  the  case  may  be — on  all  this  we  need  con- 
structive thinking,  uncrowded  by  the  hysteria  and  emotions 
born  of  the  war. 

The  creation  of  a  sentiment  of  solidarity  among  the  peo- 
ples of  the  English-speaking  world  will  do  more  to  improve 
international  relations  generally  and  to  hasten  the  era  of 
a  durable  world  peace  than  any  other  concrete  proposal  that 
has  been  advanced.  But,  unfortunately,  the  advocates  of 
an  English-speaking  union  base  their  hopes  of  its  fruition 
upon  the  assumption  that  the  United  States  and  the  British 
self-governing  dominions  are  predominantly  English  (or 
English  and  Scotch)  in  their  blood,  culture,  and  sympathies. 

535 


536         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

The  American  of  Scotch  or  English  descent,  for  instance, 
is  likely  to  say  that  this  is  an  Anglo-Saxon  country,  and 
that  the  Germans,  Irish,  and  other  Europeans  did  not  have 
to  come  here ;  when  they  did  come,  it  was  incumbent  upon 
them  to  forget  old  ties  and  to  become  assimilated  with  us. 
This  element  asserts  the  right  to  justify  close  ties  with 
Great  Britain  on  the  ground  that  ''blood  is  thicker  than 
water,"  but  denies  the  right  of  harking  back  to  the  home 
country  to  the  other  national  groups  that  go  to  make  up 
the  composite  population  of  the  United  States. 

In  1914  this  contention  was  put  squarely  before  Ameri- 
cans of  continental  European  origin.  But  it  was  never  ad- 
mitted by  them.  The  remarkable  unity  of  the  American 
nation,  after  we  went  into  the  war,  did  not  mean,  among 
Americans  of  other  than  Anglo-Saxon  origin,  the  abandon- 
ment of  affection  for,  or  pride  in,  their  own  ancestors. 
Now  that  peace  has  been  restored,  German- Americans  re- 
fuse to  accept  the  brand  of  hyphenate,  arguing  that,  until 
their  country  of  origin  became  the  enemy  of  the  United 
States,  they  had  as  much  right  to  feel  sympathetic  towards 
it  and  even  to  help  its  cause  as  did  the  Americans  of  Anglo- 
Saxon  origin  to  sympathize  with  and  help  Great  Britain. 
Americans  of  Anglo-Saxon  origin  must  remember  that  the 
United  States  from  the  beginning  contained  elements  with- 
out a  drop  of  Anglo-Saxon  blood  in  their  veins ;  that  Ger- 
mans, Irish,  and  Hollander:  fought  in  the  Revolutionary 
"War;  that  a  large  part  of  the  Irish  and  Germans  came  to 
this  country  before  the  Civil  "War ;  and  that  the  remarkable 
growth  and  prosperity  of  the  United  States  is  due  to  emi- 
gration from  continental  Europe  and  Ireland  in  the  last 
sixty  years  fully  as  much  as,  if  not  more  than,  to  what  has 
come  from  England  and  Scotland. 

The  greatness  of  the  United  States  in  the  third  decade 
of  the  twentieth  century  is  due  to  the  combined  aid  of 
several  different  elements  of  her  population.  The  elements 
that  are  not  Anglo-Saxon  are  so  numerous  and  so  powerful 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS    537 

in  wealth  and  political  influence  that  it  is  impossible  to 
build  the  structure  of  an  English-speaking  union  upon  the 
foundation  of  blood  and  cultural  ties  with  England.  The 
federal  census  for  1920  demonstrates  the  folly  of  consid- 
ering the  United  States  an  Anglo-Saxon  country.  The 
Anglo-Saxon  element  in  our  population  is  not  only  becom- 
ing proportionately  smaller  as  a  result  of  our  variegated 
immigration,  but  it  is  also  refusing  to  reproduce  itself.^ 
It  will  do  us  no  good  to  discount  the  importance  of  our 
compatriots  who  are  not  of  Anglo-Saxon  blood.  If  we 
want  to  make  English-speaking  solidarity  a  national  policy 
instead  of  a  group  cult,  we  shall  have  to  find  an  appeal  to 
the  American  public  different  from  that  of  orators  and 
writers  who  speak  to  present-day  Americans  of  our  English 
ancestors  and  our  precious  English  heritage. 

Nor  is  the  superiority  of  Anglo-Saxon  culture  an  argu- 
ment that  impresses  many  outside  the  proportionately 
dwindling  Anglo-Saxon  element.  It  smacks  too  much  of  a 
discredited  political  system  that  sought  to  replace  or  dom- 
inate other  cultures  by  the  Kultur  of  the  Ubennensch. 
Culture  is  a  vague  word.  If  it  means  traditions,  customs, 
and  mental  habits,  as  embodied  in  literature  and  preserved 
in  family  life  and  religion,  we  shall  find  many  other  Ameri- 
can elements  than  German  unwilling  to  abandon  for  the 
Anglo-Saxon  culture  what  they  brought  here  from  the  Old 
World.  Thousands  of  flourishing  communities  exist  in  the 
United  States,  nurseries  of  splendid  Americans,  where  the 
new  generation  is  being  brought  up  with  traditions,  customs, 
and  mental  habits  different  from  those  of  Anglo-Saxons. 

^  In  1921  Germans  led  in  the  number  of  naturalized  citizens,  followed  by 
Austrians,  Italians,  and  Jews.  In  New  York  City  the  birth-rate  for  foreign 
born  last  year  was  38  per  thousand;  for  native  born,  16;  and  for  the  dis- 
tricts of  the  city  from  which  membership  in  the  English-speaking  union  is 
exclusively  recruited,  7.  At  a  dinner  given  in  the  interests  of  Anglo-American 
friendship,  the  diners,  representing  the  quintessence  of  Anglo-Saxon  culture 
in  New  York,  did  not  boast  of  enough  children,  all  told,  to  amount  to 
their  own  number.  More  than  half  of  the  waiters  were  of  former  enemy  na- 
tionality, and  the  married  waiters  averaged  between  four  and  five  children. 
At  one  table  a  German  waiter  had  more  children  than  the  eight  diners  put 
together. 


538         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

From  Scandinavians  to  Italians,  the  rapidly  increasing 
groups  of  continental  European  origin  are  not  giving  up 
their  culture  for  Anglo-Saxon  culture.  So  strong  are 
atavism,  the  home  circle,  and  the  church  that  our  public 
school  system  does  not  Anglicize  the  children  in  teaching 
them  English.  We  are  unsuccessful  in  telling  Hans 
Schmidt,  Giuseppe  Tommasi,  Abram  Einstein,  Olaf  An- 
dersen, Robert  Emmet  O'Brien,  and  a  dozen  others  that 
they  are  not  good  Americans  because  they  do  not  cheer- 
fully accept  the  supremacy  of  the  English  and  Scotch 
among  us  and  the  superiority  of  English  and  Scotch  ways. 
Nothing  could  be  better  fitted  to  arouse  within  them  a  fierce 
determination  to  resist  assimilation  and  oppose  the  policy 
of  Anglo-Saxon  solidarity. 

Most  thinking  Americans,  after  a  review  of  world  politics 
during  the  past  century  and  after  the  experiences  of  the 
World  War,  agree  that  the  British  Empire  and  the  United 
States  ought  to  face  the  future  together.  An  encouraging 
beginning  in  this  direction  was  made  at  the  Washington 
conference.  But  how  are  we  going  to  create  an  irresistible 
public  opinion  in  the  United  States  in  favor  of  a  foreign 
policy  that  will  embody  as  one  of  its  cardinal  principles  the 
fostering  of  English-speaking  solidarity?  What  are  the 
bases  of  solidarity  among  English-speaking  nations? 

The  Anglo-American  community  of  blood  and  community 
of  history  are  bases  of  solidarity  to  not  more  than  half,  if 
indeed  half,  of  the  American  people.  The  blood  of  the  rest 
is  not  ours,  the  earlier  English  history  they  did  not  share 
with  us,  and  American  history  gives  them  ground  for  an- 
tagonism to  the  British  rather  than  for  sympathy  with  the 
British.  Only  the  Teutonic  element  understands  our  re- 
ligion. Community  of  culture  is  limited  to  language.  This 
is  a  bond  with  Canada,  for  there  is  constant  intercourse 
between  Canadians  and  Americans,  and  the  same  books 
and  periodicals  are  read.  It  is  becoming  a  factor  in  our 
relations  with  Australia,  also,  because  Australians  read 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS   539 

popular  American  periodical  literature.  But  beyond  the 
limited  circle  that  is  already  Anglo-Saxon  few  British 
and  Americans  come  into  personal  contact,  and  the  re- 
ciprocal purchase  of  books  and  magazines  and  newspapers 
is  surprisingly  small.  Common  language  is  an  asset 
working  in  favor  of  those  who  seek  to  bring  together  the 
English-speaking  peoples.  But  it  is  hardly  a  basis  for 
solidarity. 

We  can  appeal  to  the  whole  English-speaking  world,  how- 
ever, and  emphasize  as  bases  of  solidarity:  (1)  common 
laws  and  the  same  spirit  of  administration  of  justice;  (2) 
similar  development  of  democratic  institutions;  (3)  com- 
mon ideals;  and  (4)  common  interests.  The  first  two  are 
in  a  certain  sense  included  in  the  third  and  fourth,  and  the 
fourth  covers  the  first  three.  One  appeals  to  the  moral 
sense  and  to  self-interest,  and  then,  to  clinch  the  argument, 
shows  how  ideaUsm  is  in  harmony  with,  interest,  as  in  the 
adage,  *' Honesty  is  the  best  poUcy." 

In  discussing  these  bases  of  solidarity  it  must  be  remem- 
bered that  the  problem  involves  the  direct  relations  be- 
tween each  two  of  the  members  of  the  English-speaking 
group  of  nations  and  between  each  English-speaking  coun- 
try and  the  colonies  and  possessions  of  the  British  Empire 
and  of  the  United  States.  The  following  list  shows  how 
wide  a  field  is  covered  and  how  the  question  of  the  political 
unity  of  English-speaking  peoples  touches  many  of  the 
most  important  phases  of  world  politics : 

Great  Britain  and  United  States 
Great  Britain  and  Ireland 
Ireland  and  United  States 
Great  Britain  and  Canada 
United  States  and  Canada 
Ireland  and  Canada 
Great  Britain  and  Australia 
United  States  and  Austraha 
Ireland  and  Australia 
Canada  and  Australia 


540         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

Great  Britain  and  New  Zealand 

United  States  and  New  Zealand 

Ireland  and  New  Zealand 

Canada  and  New  Zealand 

Australia  and  New  Zealand 

Great  Britain  and  South  Africa 

United  States  and  South  Africa 

Ireland  and  South  Africa 

Canada  and  South  Africa 

Australia  and  South  Africa 

New  Zealand  and  South  Africa 

Great  Britain  and  India  and  other  possessions 

United  States  and  British  possessions 

Ireland  and  British  possessions 

Canada  and  British  possessions 

Australia  and  British  possessions 

New  Zealand  and  British  possessions 

South  Africa  and  British  possessions 

United  States  and  her  possessions 

Great  Britain  and  American  possessions 

Ireland  and  American  possessions 

Canada  and  American  possessions 

Australia  and  American  possessions 

New  Zealand  and  American  possessions 

South  Africa  and  American  possessions 

British  possessions  and  American  possessions 

Thirty-six  separate  headings  may  seem  at  first  glance 
useless  repetition.  But  some  problem  of  solidarity  arises 
affecting  primarily  the  two  parties  coupled  in  each  of  these 
relations.  In  fact,  it  is  not  difficult  to  find  several  sources 
of  friction  calling  for  adjustment,  several  problems  de- 
manding solution,  under  every  single  one  of  the  thirty-six. 
Indeed,  we  might  be  justified  in  adding  to  the  list  because 
of  the  new  responsibilities  that  have  come  to  the  British 
Empire  through  the  acquisition  of  the  former  German  colo- 
nies, some  of  which  have  been  given  to  South  Africa,  Aus- 
tralia, and  New  Zealand.  The  character  and  limitations 
of  the  mandates  are  as  yet  unsettled,  and  the  United  States 
has  questioned  the  rights  of  the  mandatories.     A  diplo- 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS    541 

matic  conflict  has  already  arisen  between  the  United  States 
and  Great  Britain  over  the  Mesopotamian  mandate.^  If 
the  United  States  feels  that  her  interests  in  German  South- 
west Africa  and  in  the  Pacific  islands  formerly  belonging 
to  Germany  are  ignored,  will  she  address  herself  to  Great 
Britain  or  directly  to  the  self-governing  dominions? 

The  years  immediately  ahead  are  years  of  peril  for  the 
solidarity  of  English-speaking  countries.  One  feels  a  cry- 
ing need  of  light,  and  more  light^  in  considering  the  quad- 
rangular character  of  relations  between  different  parts  of 
the  world  now  under  Anglo-Saxon  domination — Great 
Britain ;  the  British  dominions ;  the  United  States ;  and  the 
possessions  and  protectorates  of  Great  Britain,  the  domin- 
ions, and  the  United  States.  The  Washington  conference 
has  brought  to  the  front  and  emphasized  the  undefined 
nature  of  these  relations.  Japan?  The  Pacific?  Tariffs? 
Shipping?  Sea  power?  Status  of  the  liberated  Near 
Eastern  countries  and  of  the  former  German  colonies? 
Panama  Canal?  Monroe  Doctrine?  League  of  Nations? 
The  new  Irish  Free  State?  We  can  not  treat  these  matters 
simply  as  questions  between  London  and  Washington.  Nor 
can  Great  Britain  treat  them  that  way.  Both  London  and 
Washington  are  forced  to  take  into  consideration  the 
wishes  and  interests  of  the  self-governing  dominions  of 
the  British  Empire,  whose  virtual  independence  gives  them 
distinct  points  of  view  and  programs  of  their  o^vn.-  With 
the  exception  of  South  Africa,  the  self-governing  domin- 
ions are,  like  the  United  States,  the  outgrowth  of  Euro- 
pean civilization  transplanted  and  developed  under  the 
SBgis  of  England.  It  is  natural  that  in  mentality,  and  fre- 
quently in  interests,  they  should  be  nearer  to  us  than  to 
the  mother  country.  Canada  and  South  Africa  have  im- 
portant European  elements  that  have  not  been  under  the 
influence  of,  and  are  antipathetic  to,  Anglo-Saxon  culture. 
During  the  years  of  tension  between  the  United  Kingdom 

»See  p.  551.  'See  pp.  496-499. 


542         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  Ireland,  from  1916  to  1922,  Australia's  Irish  rivaled 
ours  in  singing  the  hymn  of  hate  against  England. 

Consciousness  and  appreciation  of  our  common  system 
of  jurisprudence  is  the  first  basis  of  Anglo-Saxon  soli- 
darity. There  is  unity  in  the  conception  and  administra- 
tion of  law  in  English-speaking  countries.  Just  laws  justly 
administered  are  the  foundation  of  civilized  society.  Those 
who  live  under  them  prize  them  more  highly  than  any  other 
possession.  No  alien,  whatever  his  origin,  fails  to  ac- 
knowledge the  blessings  of  Anglo-Saxon  law.  Our  laws 
and  our  courts  are  the  outgrowth  of  centuries  of  English 
history  and  experience.  They  offer  the  greatest  protec- 
tion to  the  individual  and  the  widest  possibility  of  per- 
sonal freedom  that  the  world  has  ever  known.  Within 
recent  years,  if  America  meant  to  the  immigrant  "the 
home  of  the  free,"  it  was  because  of  the  scrupulous  admin- 
istration of  justice  according  to  the  laws  handed  down  to 
us  from  colonial  days.  Similarly  the  emigrant  from  con- 
tinental Europe  who  went  to  a  British  colony  was  sure  of 
a  ** square  deal."  Before  the  law  he  was  the  equal  of  any 
other  man.  Entering  our  society,  he  shared  immediately 
the  benefits  of  our  most  sacred  heritage — free  speech,  free 
assembly,  the  habeas  corpus  act,  and  the  principles  of 
Anglo-Saxon  law  assured  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  United 
States  not  only  by  custom  and  our  system  of  jurisprudence, 
but  by  the  first  amendments  of  the  Constitution.  As  far 
as  laws  and  the  administration  of  justice  are  concerned, 
the  English-speaking  countries  have  had  a  similar  develop- 
ment, and  this  powerful  link  that  binds  them  to  England 
more  closely  than  a  common  language  has  not  been  severed. 

Political  institutions  and  jurisprudence  go  together. 
Although  the  American  commonwealth  has  developed  its 
political  institutions  with  less  strict  adherence  to  English 
standards  than  in  the  case  of  jurisprudence,  the  modifica- 
tions do  not  affect  the  spirit  of  the  representative  govern- 
ment we  received  from  England.     When  the  American 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS    543 

colonies  fought  the  mother  country,  it  was  to  preserve  their 
rights  as  Englishmen,  which  they  believed  had  not  been 
forfeited  by  transplantation.  The  War  of  Independence 
established  a  principle  that  has  been  vital  in  the  develop- 
ment of  English-speaking  countries.  Canada,  Australia, 
New  Zealand,  and  South  Africa  owe  to  the  American  rebels 
the  possession  of  Anglo-Saxon  liberties  in  new  worlds 
without  having  had  to  fight  for  them. 

The  continental  European  who  emigrates  to  white  men's 
countries  under  the  Anglo-Saxon  form  of  government  be^ 
comes,  after  naturalization,  an  equal  partner  with  every 
other  citizen.  He  votes.  He  is  eligible  for  office.  No 
argument  is  necessary  to  convince  him  of  the  advantages 
of  living  under  Anglo-Saxon  political  institutions.  If  these 
institutions  are  properly  administered,  he  appreciates  them 
as  highly  as  he  appreciates  Anglo-Saxon  jurisprudence. 
The  second  basis  of  solidarity  among  English-speaking 
peoples,  therefore,  is  Anglo-Saxon  polity,  and  it  can  be 
urged  upon  Americans  who  are  unresponsive  to  the  call  of 
blood  and  culture. 

Every  inhabitant  of  English-speaking  countries  is  in- 
terested in  the  maintenance  and  defense  of  the  jurispru- 
dence and  polity  under  which  he  lives.  We  must  prove  to 
him,  first  of  all,  that  we  ourselves  cherish  this  jurispru- 
dence and  this  polity;  that  (whatever  the  lapses  of  the  war 
years)  we  intend  to  conduct  our  national  life  in  the  strict 
spirit  of  them ;  and  that  he  is  our  partner  in  their  benefits. 
Then  we  can  point  out  to  him  that  English-speaking  coun- 
tries can  not  afford  to  risk  the  deterioration  or  loss  of  these 
precious  possessions  by  pursuing  antagonistic  policies  in 
the  electrically  charged  post-bellum  world,  and  he  will 
begin  to  see  the  common  sense  of  a  rapprochement  between 
Great  Britain,  her  dominions,  and  ourselves. 

Community  of  ideals,  the  third  basis  of  solidarity,  fur- 
nishes a  powerful  argument  to  the  inhabitants  of  English- 
speaking  countries   to   stick  together.     The  World  War 


544         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

touched  the  soul  of  the  English-speaking  peoples,  and  the 
sacrifices  necessary  to  victory  were  consented  to,  in  Great 
Britain  and  the  dominions  as  in  the  United  States,  because 
of  the  moral  indignation  of  the  people  and  their  respon- 
siveness to  the  crusader  appeal.  In  a  certain  sense  the 
United  States  was  kicked  into  the  war,  because  pubhc 
opinion  demanded  that  Germany's  challenge  be  accepted. 
But,  after  we  entered  it,  the  remarkable  effort  in  man 
power  and  money  made  by  the  United  States  was  due,  not 
to  spontaneous  combustion,  but  to  the  clever  propaganda 
of  official  and  unofficial  organizations,  assisted  by  the  press. 
Germany's  crime  and  America's  ideals  were  what  brought 
us  to  the  fighting-point  and  kept  us  there.  Despite  our 
mixture  of  blood  and  of  cultural  backgrounds,  successive 
generations  of  development  under  English  jurisdiction  and 
polity  have  imbued  us  with  an  idealism  that  is  distinctly 
Anglo-Saxon.  It  was  slow  to  awake,  but  when  it  did  awake, 
the  people  of  the  United  States  were  ready  to  make  every 
sacrifice  for  the  triumph  of  the  ideals  embodied  by  Presi- 
dent Wilson  in  his  war  speeches. 

Speaking  at  Manchester  in  December,  1918,  on  the  eve 
of  the  peace  conference,  the  President  declared  that  the 
United  States  could  never  enter  into  any  league  that  was 
not  an  association  of  all  nations  for  the  common  good.  He 
undoubtedly  had  in  mind  the  formidable  number  of  millions 
of  Americans  who  were  reluctant  to  aid  Anglo-Saxon  and 
Latin  against  Teuton,  but  who  supported  the  war  against 
Germany  without  hesitation  because  Germany  stood  for 
militarism,  autocracy,  imperialism,  and  the  oppression  of 
small  nations.  Mr.  Wilson  knew  that  these  millions  of  loyal 
Americans  would  not  feel  called  upon  to  sanction  and  col- 
laborate in  enforcing  a  sordid  and  materialistic  peace  that 
would  make  some  races  or  peoples  masters  of  others.  For 
the  sake  of  idealism  and  for  the  United  States,  their 
adopted  country,  they  fought  against  kith  and  kin,  shoulder 
to  shoulder  with  those  whom  they  believed,  rightly  or 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS   545 

wrongly,  to  be  the  oppressors  or  enemies  of  their  country 
of  origin.  Can  we  expect  our  compatriots  of  German  or 
Irish  or  Slavic  stock  to  support  a  European  and  a  world 
order  based  upon  the  permanent  inferiority  and  subjection 
of  those  whose  blood  runs  in  their  veins  and  whose  culture 
their  home  training  has  taught  them  to  respect  and  foster? 

Some  unthinking  Americans  hotly  answer  in  the  affirma- 
tive, and  revive  the  epithet  of  hyphenate.  But  in  doing  so 
they  reveal  themselves  to  be  backsliding  Anglo-Saxons.  A 
sense  of  justice  and  the  ability  to  put  one's  self  in  the 
other  man's  place  are  the  Anglo-Saxon  qualities  par  ex- 
cellence. One  who  is  of  pure  British  blood  and  who  has 
been  steeped  in  Anglo-Saxon  traditions  can  not  help  look- 
ing with  contempt  upon  parvenus  who  are  plus  royalistes 
que  le  roi.  The  American  of  German  or  Irish  origin  who 
speaks  or  works  for  Anglo-Saxon  racial  and  cultural  su- 
premacy is  a  strange  creature.  ''If  I  forget  thee,  0  Jeru- 
salem," is  a  sacred  sentiment  to  the  decent-minded  man. 
The  pride  I  have  in  my  ancestry  and  my  sense  of  partner- 
ship in  English  history  and  traditions  enable  me  to  respect 
others  for  thinking  of  other  countries  as  I  think  of  Eng- 
land. Insisting  that  they  foul  their  own  nests  is  a  sad  test 
for  recruits  to  Anglo-Saxon  solidarity.  Americans  who 
maintain  that  it  is  our  duty  as  good  citizens  of  the  United 
States  to  work  for  the  material  advancement  of  Great 
Britain  because  of  kinship  are  appeaUng  to  group  feeling, 
not  national  feeling,  and  are  therefore  as  guilty  of  h^^Dhen- 
ism  as  are  the  propagandists  of  other  group  partizanships. 

The  justification  for  advocating  political  cooperation 
among  English-speaking  peoples,  if  we  are  appealing  to 
the  sentiment  of  the  American  people,  is,  therefore,  that 
this  group  of  peoples  is  using  its  influence,  in  international 
relations,  for  the  triumph  of  a  new  world  order.  The  sine 
qua  non  of  the  rapprochement  is  harmony  of  ideals.  Great 
Britain  will  be  drawn  to  us,  the  self-governing  dominions 
will  be  drawn  to  us,  and  we  shall  be  drawn  to  Great  Britain 


546         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

and  the  self-governing  dominions  if  and  because  we  have 
common  ideals.  On  both  sides  we  need  to  discuss  the  claims 
of  weaker  nations  courageously  and  endeavor  to  remedy 
shortcomings  in  following  ideals;  for  this  is  the  way  to 
remove  sources  of  friction  and  barriers  to  English-speaking 
solidarity. 

In  regard  to  Germany,  Great  Britain  has  acted  admirably 
and  is  living  up  to  her  ideals  of  fair  play  and  is  not  kick- 
ing the  other  fellow  when  he  is  down.  The  generous  settle- 
ment of  the  Irish  question  is  a  great  step  forward  to  the 
establishment  of  good  feeling  among  English-speaking 
countries.  We  must  strive  to  make  the  association  of 
English-speaking  nations  a  committee  for  giving  Anglo- 
Saxon  liberties  to  the  whole  world.  This  thought  came  to 
me  with  peculiar  force  when  I  stood  on  the  spot  in  the 
Moses  Taylor  Pyne  estate  where  are  buried  those  who  fell 
in  the  battle  of  Princeton.  On  a  bronze  tablet  are  inscribed 
the  words  of  Alfred  Noyes : 

**Here  freedom  stood  by  slaughtered  friend  and  foe, 
And,  ere  the  wrath  paled,  or  that  sunset  died, 
Looked  through  the  ages,  then,  with  eyes  aglow, 
Laid  them  to  wait  that  future,  side  by  side. ' ' 

The  * 'future,  side  by  side"  of  English-speaking  coun- 
tries can  mean  only  working  for  the  spread  of  freedom. 
We  shall  not  help  each  other  to  deny  freedom  to  others, 
and  if  we  did  join  in  an  Anglo-Saxon  freebooting  expedi- 
tion across  the  world,  we  should  quickly  follow  the  law  of 
pirates  and  be  at  each  other's  throats. 

But  common  idealism  is  not  sufficient  as  cement  and  as 
motive  power.  In  every  human  association  interest  is  the 
corner-stone.  Men  cooperate  in  no  undertaking  in  which 
the  element  of  mutual  advantage  does  not  play  the  pre- 
dominating role.  Other  factors  are  present,  of  course,  and 
mutual  interest  may  not  be  the  exciting  cause  of  entering 
into  a  common  undertaking.     But  is  not  interest  the  tie 


SOLIDARITY  AMONG  ENGLISH-SPEAKING  NATIONS   547 

that  binds,  as  well  as  the  foundation  upon  which  is  built, 
human  society?  The  three  bases  of  solidarity  among 
English-speaking  peoples  already  suggested  have  in  them 
the  element  of  interest.  The  fourth  basis  of  solidarity  is 
the  mutual  discovery  of  tangible  benefits  accruing  to  all 
alike  from  cooperation  in  international  aifairs. 

What  are  the  interests  we  might  have  in  common?  Are 
they  numerous  and  important  enough  to  justify  a  close 
union  among  English-speaking  countries?  ^^at  particu- 
lar interests  would  have  to  be  sacrificed  in  order  to  further 
the  common  interests?  Are  the  sacrifices  possible?  Is  it 
worth  while  to  make  them?  A  study  of  world  politics  is 
necessary  before  we  can  answer  these  questions.  But 
those  who  believe  that  the  political  and  economic  rap- 
prochement of  English-speaking  peoples  is  a  possibility 
that  ought  to  be  carefully  considered  will  fail  of  appre- 
ciable results  unless  they  realize  the  composite  racial  and 
cultural  character  of  the  American  nation  and  unless  they 
are  willing  to  discuss  new  questions  frankly  and  with  de- 
tachment in  the  good  old  English  fashion. 


CHAPTER  XLVIII 


THE  CONTINUATION  CONFERENCES:  FROM  LONDON  TO 
GENOA  (1919-1922) 

THE  victors  in  the  World  War  attempted  to  arrange 
terms  of  peace  in  a  conference  from  which  the  van- 
quished were  excluded.  Because  the  victors  were  unable 
to  compromise  their  divergent  aspirations  and  foreign 
policies  and  were  unwilling  to  arrange  to  enforce  the  peace 
by  automatic  military  measures,  this  method  of  peace- 
making failed.  Of  the  justice  and  wisdom  of  the  Paris 
treaties  there  was  room  for  an  honest  difference  of  opin- 
ion. Of  their  practicability  no  difference  of  opinion  was 
possible.  It  was  immediately  recognized  that  the  Paris 
conference  had  not  accomplished  its  purpose,  and  there 
began  a  series  of  continuation  conferences  that  followed 
one  another  in  rapid  succession  for  three  years. 

Before  the  Paris  conference  formally  ended,  the  pre- 
miers, secretaries  of  foreign  affairs,  and  ambassadors  of 
Great  Britain,  France,  and  Italy  began  to  hold  special 
meetings  to  discuss  unfinished  business  and  new  problems 
as  they  arose.  At  the  end  of  November,  1919,  when  the 
treaty  of  Versailles  was  not  yet  in  operation  and  the 
League  of  Nations  was  not  yet  functioning,  representa- 
tives of  the  three  powers  conferred  in  London  on  the 
Greek  crisis,  the  Fiume  situation,  and  the  devolution  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire.  In  January,  1920,  the  Italians  conferred 
with  the  British  in  London  and  then  with  the  British  and 
French  in  Paris  on  the  Adriatic  problem.  An  agreement 
was  reached,  to  which  it  was  hoped  the  United  States  would 
assent.  Although  its  details  were  kept  secret,  the  agree- 
ment was  announced  as  the  final  word  of  the  three  powers 

548 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)  549 

on  the  Fiume  and  Albanian  questions,  and  was  com- 
municated to  Serbia  in  the  form  of  an  ultimatum.  The 
Serbians  were  summoned  to  consent  to  the  status  of  a 
free  city  for  Fiume,  its  frontiers  touching  on  Italian 
Istria,  with  port  and  railway  facilities  placed  under  the 
League  of  Nations,  with  the  alternative  of  seeing  the  three 
allies  put  into  operation  the  secret  treaty  of  London,  which 
would  have  meant  the  extension  of  Italian  sovereignty  over 
the  better  part  of  Dalmatia.  Parts  of  Albania  were  to  be 
given  to  Serbia  and  Greece,  and  the  rest  of  that  country 
placed  under  an  Italian  mandate. 

The  United  States  protested  vigorously  against  the 
policy  of  coercing  Serbia  and  partitioning  Albania.  Italy 
and  Serbia  finally  agreed  upon  a  compromised  frontier,  and 
in  the  treaty  of  Eapallo,  November  12,  1920,  Serbia  sacri- 
ficed Fiume  to  save  Dalmatia.  The  Albanian  arrangement 
was  modified,  chiefly  because  of  the  ability  of  the  Albanians 
to  protect  their  frontiers  against  Serbians  and  Greeks  and 
to  expel  the  Italians;  and  Albania  was  admitted  to  the 
League  of  Nations.^ 

The  San  Eemo  conference,  which  opened  on  April  19, 
1920,  had  as  its  agenda  (1)  the  execution  of  the  treaty  of 
Versailles,  (2)  Eussian  affairs,  and  (3)  the  settlement  of  the 
terms  of  the  Turkish  treaty.  These  three  questions,  debated 
in  secrecy,  were  neither  envisaged  nor  decided  on  their 
merits ;  but  they  were  debated  at  the  same  time,  and  each 
premier  gave  in  on  some  point  in  order  to  have  his  way 
on  others.  Millerand  won  on  Germany;  Lloyd  George  on 
Turkey;  and  Nitti  on  Eussia.  All  three  premiers  pro- 
fessed to  be  satisfied,  and  declared  that  they  were  in  har- 
mony.    But  San  Eemo  was  the  beginning  of  a  marked 

^  The  Italian  government  had  great  difficulties  throughout  the  year  1920 
with  an  important  and  aggressive  nationalist  movement,  which  supported 
d'Annunzio  and  his  legionaries,  who  continued  to  hold  Fiume  in  defiance  of 
the  Entente  governments  and  the  League  of  Nations.  The  treaty  of  Rapallo 
was  decided  upon  at  a  conference  at  Santa  Margherita  Ligure,  which  ended 
on  November  10.  Although  the  Italian  parliament  ratified  the  treaty  by  a 
substantial  majority,  d'Annunzio  refused  to  accept  it,  and  declared  war  on 
his  own  country.     He  was  ousted  by  the  Italian  army  on  Christmas  eve. 


550         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

divergence  in  the  policies  of  Great  Britain  and  France  in 
the  Near  East  and  towards  Germany,  and  of  the  with- 
drawal of  Italy  from  an  active  part  in  the  Near  East  and 
from  supporting  France  against  Germany.  Nitti  resigned, 
failed  in  an  attempt  to  form  a  new  cabinet,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded on  June  9  by  the  veteran  Giolitti,  who  announced 
that  the  object  of  his  foreign  policy  would  be  "to  insure 
definite  and  complete  peace  for  Italy  and  the  whole  of 
Europe,  in  order  to  achieve  w^hich  we  must,  without  delay, 
establish  friendly  relations  with  all  other  peoples,  and, 
without  restrictions,  resume  normal  relations  even  with 
the  Russian  government." 

The  three  powers  agreed  upon  the  terms  of  the  treaty 
which  the  Constantinople  Turks  later  signed  at  Sevres,^ 
and  divided  the  mandates,  Syria  and  Cilicia  going  to 
France,  Adalia  and  Rhodes  to  Italy,  and  Mesopotamia, 
including  Mosul,  and  Palestine  to  Great  Britain.  France 
and  Italy  agreed  to  let  Great  Britain  guard  the  Straits, 
and  thus  virtually  control  the  Constantinople  region.  ' 

Lloyd  George  and  Nitti  had  wanted  the  Germans  to  be 
invited  to  San  Remo,  and  bitterly  opposed  the  intention  of 
France  to  use  the  indemnity  to  prevent  the  economic  re- 
habilitation of  central  Europe.  But,  as  Millerand  had 
given  in  on  Lloyd  George's  Near  Eastern  claims  and  on 
Nitti 's  demand  for  a  free  hand  to  reopen  trade  relations 
with  Russia,  he  was  able  to  secure  the  pledge  of  his  col- 
leagues that  no  revision  of  the  treaty  was  contemplated 
and  that  France  would  be  supported  in  insisting  upon  a 
strict  and  literal  fulfilment  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles.  A 
note  was  sent  to  Germany  summoning  her  to  disarm  by 
destroying  war  materials  and  reducing  her  army,  and  to 
begin  paying  reparations  by  huge  deliveries  of  coal.  The 
German  government  was  ordered  to  send  delegates  to  Spa 
on  May  25,  ready  to  submit  a  plan  for  meeting  the  demands 
of  the  Allies. 

^See  pp.  431-433. 

y 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)    551 

France,  on  the  other  hand,  had  not  gained  the  support 
of  Great  Britain  and  Italy  against  Germany  without  con- 
cessions in  another  quarter  than  Turkey  and  Russia. 
The  invitation  to  Spa  was  the  first  admission  on  the  part 
of  France  of  the  advisabiUty  of  discussing  the  fulfilment 
of  treaty  terms  mth  Germany;  the  threatening  note  to 
Germany  contained  a  clause  assuring  her  that  it  was  not 
the  intention  of  the  AlUed  powers  to  annex  any  portion 
of  German  territory  and  that  ''in  cases  where  the  German 
government  was  faced  with  unavoidable  difficulties  the 
Allied  governments  would  not  necessarily  insist  upon 
literal  interpretation  of  the  treaty  terms";  and  France 
agreed  to  refrain  from  again  taking  coercive  measures 
"without  the  consent  and  cooperation  of  the  other  two 
powers. 

On  April  24  a  secret  oil  agreement  was  signed  at  San 
Remo  by  British  and  French  delegates,  providing  for  an 
equal  division  of  interests  and  exploitation  in  Rumania  and 
for  a  quarter  interest  to  France  in  Mesopotamia  and  a 
quarter  interest  in  Anglo-Persian  oil  piped  to  the  Medi- 
terranean through  territory  under  French  mandate  in  re- 
turn for  the  provision  by  France  of  pipe  lines  and  branch 
railways  for  the  movement  of  British  oil  through  her 
spheres  of  influence  to  the  Mediterranean.  On  November 
20  Secretary  Colby  protested  against  the  San  Remo  agree- 
ment and  declared  that  the  United  States  refused  to  recog- 
nize the  establishment  of  a  British  oil  monopoly  in  Meso- 
potamia and  other  mandated  territories.  This  protest 
was  made  after  the  British  government  had  denied  the 
existence  of  the  monopoly  and  the  United  States  govern- 
ment had  found  evidence  to  the  contrary.  Instead  of 
acknowledging  American  rights,  the  British  entered  into 
a  new  secret  convention  with  the  French  on  December  23, 
1920,  confirming  the  previous  agreement  and  excluding 
the  United  States  and  other  powers  from  the  possibility 
of  working  profitably  ante-bellum  concessions  in  Mesopo- 


552         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

tamia,  let  alone  of  acquiring  and  developing  further  ones> 
On  April  29  Lloyd  George  told  the  House  of  Commons 
that  the  German  ministers  were  to  come  to  Spa  prepared 
to  make  definite  proposals  concerning  the  method  by  which 
they  intended  to  pay,  how  large  an  annuity  they  were  able 
to  give,  and  to  explain  how  they  were  planning  to  complete 
the  work  of  disarmament  and  bring  the  war  criminals  to 
trial.  But  it  was  patent  that  the  Entente  powers  were  not 
agreed  themselves  upon  the  amount  of  the  indemnity  they 
intended  to  ask  and  the  proportionate  division  of  the  sums 
to  be  received  from  Germany.  Every  critic  of  the  treaty 
of  Versailles  had  pointed  out  the  absurdity  of  attempting 
to  get  any  considerable  payment  out  of  Germany  until  she 
knew  just  how  much  she  was  expected  to  pay.  During  the 
San  Remo  discussion  Millerand  had  refused  to  agree  upon 
the  principle  of  fixing  a  lump  sum.  Consequently,  a  new 
conference  was  arranged  at  Hythe  on  May  15  to  discuss 
the  program  for  the  Spa  meeting.  The  French  claim  as 
preferential  creditor  in  the  distribution  of  the  indemnity 
was  admitted,  and  it  was  agreed  that  there  should  be  no 
discussion  of  treaty  revision  at  Spa.  France  succeeded  in 
raising  the  amount  of  the  indemnity  from  the  British  fig- 
ure of  100,000,000,000  to  120,000,000,000  francs.  The  Hythe 
conference  gave  the  Entente  powers  for  the  first  time  a 
financial  program ;  but  it  provoked  Poincare,  the  president 
of  the  Reparations  Commission,  to  resign  his  position  on 
the  ground  that  the  premiers  had  usurped  one  of  the  most 
important  functions  assigned  to  the  commission.  The 
treaty  of  Versailles  had  provided  that  the  Reparations 
Commission  decide  the  total  indemnity  after  two  years  of 
examination  of  German  resources. 

The  attitude  of  the  French  in  regard  to  the  size  of  the 
indemnity  and  of  the  Italians  and  the  Rumanians  in  regard 
to  their  share  of  it  necessitated  further  preliminary  con- 

*  The   text   of   the   two    secret    agreements   is   given   by   H.    Woodhouse   in 
Current  History  (New  York,  January,  1922),  pages  653-656. 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)    553 

ferences  at  Boulogne  and  Brussels,  where  statesmen 
haggled  like  pawnbrokers  and  concessions  were  made  that 
common  sense  knew  threatened  to  defeat  the  hope  of  keep- 
ing alive  the  goose  to  lay  golden  eggs.  Italy  and  Rumania 
refused  to  be  satisfied  with  claims  to  indemnity  against  the 
bankrupt  Hapsburg  empire.  Italy  held  out  for  20  per  cent, 
of  the  German  indemnity,  and  agreed  at  Brussels  to  admit 
the  French  lump  sum  of  150,000,000,000  franc's  only  when 
her  delegates  were  solemnly  promised  a  higher  proportion 
of  the  indemnity  than  had  been  allotted  them  in  earlier 
conferences.^ 

The  Spa  conference  opened  on  July  5,  and  marked  the 
abandonment  of  the  consistent  policy  of  the  victors  since 
the  armistice  of  treating  with  Germany  only  by  written 
notes  ending  in  peremptory  threats  of  force.  For  the  first 
time  German  statesmen  were  able  to  discuss  questions 
orally.  The  conference  lasted  eleven  days,  and  ended  in 
an  agreement  that  added  to  the  obligations  Germany  had 
assumed  at  Versailles.  Germany  bound  herself  under  pen- 
alties to  deliver  two  million  tons  of  coal  per  month,  to  hand 
over  live  stock  to  the  victors,  to  proceed  to  the  punishment 
of  war  criminals,  and  to  insist  upon  the  surrender  of  arms 
in  the  hands  of  civilians  and  withdraw  arms  from  the 
security  police.  By  January  1,  1921,  the  army  was  to  be 
reduced  to  the  figure  stipulated  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Allies  agreed  to  lend  Germany  large 
sums  to  build  up  her  disorganized  industries.  France  was 
skeptical  of  the  results  of  the  agreement,  but  Lloyd  George 
declared  that  the  road  from  Spa  was  the  road  to  reality. 

While  the  Spa  conference  was  in  session  news  came  of 

*At  Spa,  before  going  into  the  conference  with  Germany,  the  powers 
finally  agreed  upon  the  following  distribution  of  the  indemnity  annuities: 
France,  52  per  cent.;  Great  Britain,  22;  Italy,  10;  Belgium,  8;  Serbia,  5; 
all  the  rest,  3.  Belgium  was  also  permitted  to  transfer  her  entire  war  debt 
to  Germany,  and  her  priority  was  recognized  on  the  first  2,000,000,000  gold 
marks.  But  the  conferees  were  still  at  loggerheads  over  the  amount  of  the 
indemnity,  and  it  was  decided  to  let  this  run  over  until  a  later  date.  The 
treaty  gave  until  May  1,  1921 — there  was  still  a  year  of  grace  1 


554         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

the  collapse  of  the  Polish  campaign  against  soviet  Russia, 
and  during  the  summer  conferences  were  held  at  Lympne 
and  Hythe  to  decide  upon  the  policy  of  the  Entente  towards 
Poland  and  Russia.  It  was  an  embarrassing  situation ;  for 
France  was  strongly  backing  Poland,  and  yet  the  British 
sense  of  fairness  could  not  but  react  against  flagrantly 
adopting  two  weights  and  two  measures  in  dealing  with 
Poland  and  Russia.  There  had  been  no  intervention  in 
favor  of  Russia  when  the  Polish  armies  went  far  beyond 
the  line  set  by  the  Supreme  Council.  Could  the  AlHes 
stultify  themselves  by  calling  upon  Russia  to  halt  when  the 
Poles  were  losing?  Was  it  to  be  ''heads  I  win,  tails  you 
lose"?  At  Hythe,  despite  the  urging  of  Marshal  Foch,  it 
was  decided  to  help  Poland  with  munitions  but  not  to  send 
Allied  troops  to  Warsaw.  At  Lympne  Lloyd  George  per- 
suaded the  Allies  to  agree  that  if  Poland  accepted  the  terms 
of  soviet  Russia  they  would  not  intervene  to  prevent  or 
upset  the  arrangement.  Only  if  Russia  insisted  upon  terms 
"not  consistent  with  the  existence  of  Poland  as  a  free 
nation"  were  the  Alhes  to  assist  Poland.  But  not  even 
then  would  troops  be  sent.  Aid  would  be  given  in  equip- 
ment and  military  advice,  by  naval  pressure,  by  interna- 
tional economic  boycott,  and  by  sending  supplies  to  General 
Wrangel,  who  was  leading  a  counter-revolutionary  move- 
ment in  south  Russia.  Great  Britain  and  France  could  not 
see  alike  on  this  question.  The  British  government  was  at 
the  time  negotiating  a  trade  agreement  with  Russia.  When 
the  fortune  of  arms  turned,  and  Poles  drove  back  the 
Bolshevists,  the  French,  without  consulting  their  allies, 
recognized  General  Wrangel  as  a  belligerent,  and  thus  gave 
the  Russians  one  more  reason  to  hate  their  former  ally. 
On  November  11  the  French  and  British  governments 
announced  a  new  plan  for  settling  the  amount  and  method 
of  collection  of  the  German  indemnity — a  plan  that  would 
allow  the  Reparations  Commission  to  play,  figuratively  at 
least,  the  role  assigned  to  it  by  the  treaty  of  Versailles. 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)  555 

The  commission  was  to  choose  experts  who  were  to  meet 
at  Brussels  to  hear  representatives  of  the  German  govern- 
ment and  then  report  to  the  commission;  members  of  the 
German  cabinet  were  to  confer  with  the  Allied  premiers  at 
Geneva  when  the  Reparations  Commission  should  have 
acted  upon  the  Brussels  report ;  and  then  in  a  final  session 
at  Paris  the  Reparations  Commission  would  consider  the 
Brussels  and  Geneva  recommendations,  and  fix  a  lump  sum 
for  the  Germans  to  pay  and  a  sliding  scale  of  the  annuities. 

The  Brussels  conference  (December  16-21),  being  con- 
fined to  experts,  was  successful.  The  Allied  delegates  were 
impressed  with  Germany's  intention  to  do  the  best  she 
could,  and  recommended  that  she  be  allowed  3,000,000,000 
gold  marks  of  credits  for  food  and  about  the  same  for  raw 
materials.  Upon  the  basis  of  credits  to  make  possible  the 
resumption  of  German  production  and  of  100,000,000,000 
gold  marks  as  the  total  indemnity,  the  Allied  experts  re- 
ported that  the  problem  of  paying  the  indemnity  was  cap- 
able of  solution. 

But  political  considerations  again  entered  into  the  situ- 
ation. The  French  press  recalled  that  when  the  British  and 
French  premiers  were  discussing  how  aid  was  to  be  given 
to  Poland  at  Lympne  the  previous  summer,  Lloyd  George, 
in  consideration  of  Marshal  Foch  withdrawing  his  de- 
mand for  troops  to  aid  the  Poles,  had  consented  to  make 
a  joint  declaration  to  the  effect  that  ''the  suffering 
and  economic  ruin  resulting  from  the  war  should  not  be 
borne  by  the  nations  who  did  not  cause  it."  The  French 
now  insisted  that  the  British  make  good  their  frequently 
reiterated  promises  to  make  Germany  pay.  A  new  con- 
ference opened  in  Paris  on  January  24,  1921,  which  re- 
vealed to  the  world  the  hopeless  divergence  between  the 
French  and  British  points  of  view. 

In  the  discussion  of  disarmament  Foch  and  others  de- 
clared that  Germany  had  failed  to  fulfil  the  disarmament 
clauses  of  the  Versailles  treaty,  and  that  the  danger  was 


556         AN  INTKODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

so  great  that  France  would  be  justified,  as  a  miltary  pre- 
caution alone,  in  occuping  the  Ruhr  Valley.  Lloyd  George 
answered  that  the  French  fears  were  not  justified.  France 
demanded  that  the  indemnity  be  fixed  at  400,000,000,000 
gold  marks,  Lloyd  George  answered  that  Germany  could 
not  pay  this  amount.  M.  Doumer  contradicted  the  British 
premier,  explaining  that  it  was  reasonable  to  expect  17,000,- 
000,000  francs  per  annum  from  German  exports,  of  which 
12,000,000,000  could  be  taken  by  the  Reparations  Commis- 
sion. Lloyd  George  said  that  this  calculation  was  absurd, 
because  it  ignored  the  factor  of  raw  materials  essential  for 
manufactures.  How  could  Germany  pay  for  her  raw  ma- 
terials, coal,  labor,  etc.,  on  the  basis  of  retaining  five 
billions  out  of  seventeen  billions'?  The  Italians  stood  with 
the  British. 

On  January  27  ex-Premier  Millerand,  who  had  now  be- 
come president  of  France,  intervened  to  end  the  dead- 
lock, and  the  plan  of  the  Boulogne  conference  was  substi- 
tuted as  the  basis  of  discussion  which  provided  for  an  in- 
demnity of  100,000,000,000  gold  marks,  which,  with  interest, 
would  make  a  lump  sum  of  250,000,000,000  gold  marks  in 
annuities.  It  was  decided  that  Germany  should  pay  in 
forty-two  annual  instalments  226,000,000,000  gold  marks, 
and  for  the  same  period  an  annual  tax  of  12  per  cent,  on 
her  exports.  If  these  conditions  were  not  fulfilled,  the 
Allies  should  have  the  right  to  seize  German  customs,  im- 
pose taxes  on  the  Rhineland  and  military  penalties,  and 
exercise  financial  control  over  Germany  at  the  first  de- 
fault. But  as  the  treaty  had  set  thirty  years  as  the  limit 
of  Germany's  servitude,  and  this  plan  provided  for  twelve 
additional  years,  it  was  necessary  to  secure  Germany's  con- 
sent. The  Berlin  government  was  ordered  to  send  experts 
to  renew  the  Brussels  discussions  on  the  basis  of  the  Paris 
agreement,  and  to  be  ready  to  meet  the  AlUes  in  London 
on  February  28. 

The  London  conference  failed  to  arrive  at  any  agree- 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)  557 

ment,  whereupon  the  Entente  powers  and  Belgium  threat- 
ened to  levy  an  import  tax  of  50  per  cent,  on  German 
goods  entering  their  countries,  and  to  force  Germany  to 
pay  the  tax,  which  would  be  pooled  and  divided  as  indem- 
nity. Dr.  Simons  then  told  the  Entente  statesmen  that 
such  a  tax  would  mean  either  that  the  German  exporters 
would  add  this  amount  to  their  price  and  the  consumers 
eventually  pay  it,  or  that  German  trade  would  go  to  the 
wall.  Despite  the  announcement  of  the  Allies  that  they 
would  collect  the  customs  tariffs  in  the  Ehineland  and  of 
the  French  government  that  the  Ruhr  coal  region  would 
be  seized  if  the  German  government  did  not  consent  to 
the  Paris  decision  and  pay  down  12,000,000,000  gold  marks 
on  or  before  May  1st,  the  final  German  answer  was  refusal. 
The  delegates  left  the  London  conference  with  the  whole 
question  still  up  in  the  air. 

At  the  last  moment,  yielding  to  an  ultimatum  as  she  had  jX^Jtr  <^-«-C-4 
done  in  signing  the  treaty,  Germany  prevented  the  occu-  ^^^^  ^s^juSu^f^ 
pation  of  the  Ruhr  Valley  by  agreeing  on  May  11  to  pay  //jp 
the  indemnity,  and  the  initial  sums  stipulated  were  trans-  "^"^Tl^^Jk 
ferred  to  the  credit  of  the  Reparations  Commission. 

But  in  the  summer  the  League  Council,  which  met  at 
San  Sebastian  from  July  30  to  August  5,  felt  that  economic 
conditions  in  Europe,  and  in  fact  throughout  the  world, 
were  gromng  worse,  and  that  some  form  of  international 
cooperation  was  imperative.  A  financial  conference  was 
called  to  meet  at  Brussels  on  September  24,  to  which 
invitations  were  sent  to  every  nation  except  Turkey  and 
Russia.  Delegates  from  thirty-six  countries  met  under  the 
presidency  of  ex-President  Ador  of  Switzerland.  An  unof- 
ficial American  delegate  explained  that  the  United  States 
could  not  participate  in  the  conference,  and  would  not  be 
able,  in  fact,  to  take  active  steps  to  aid  European  rehabili- 
tation until  old  scores  were  marked  off  and  a  spirit  of 
solidarity  was  developed.  The  most  important  results  of 
the  Brussels  conference  were  the  revelation  of  the  fact 


558         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

that  the  Paris  treaties  were  largely  responsible  for  the 
economic  and  financial  chaos,  and  the  announcement  by 
M.  ter  Meulen,  of  Holland,  of  a  practicable  plan  for  aiding 
countries  on  the  verge  of  collapse.  He  proposed  to  estab- 
lish in  these  countries  a  reservoir  of  collateral  to  be  drawer 
upon  if  necessary  to  cover  credits  for  imports,  under  the 
supervision  of  a  commission  of  financial  experts  appointed 
by  the  League  of  Nations.  The  commission  would  assess 
the  value  of  the  collateral  offered,  and  the  government  of 
the  borrower's  country  would  issue  bonds,  secured  by  the 
collateral,  and  running  for  from  five  to  ten  years,  with 
interest.  The  commission  and  the  governments  would 
thus  arrange  credits  for  private  individuals. 

Believing  that,  while  the  United  States  should  not»become 
involved  in  European  political  questions,  it  was  still  in- 
cumbent upon  us  to  lead  in  restoring  the  world  to  normal 
conditions,  President  Harding,  shortly  after  his  inaugura- 
tion, invited  nine  powers  to  discuss  the  limitation  of  arma- 
ments and  the  problems  of  the  Pacific  at  a  conference  to 
assemble  in  Washington  on  November  12,  1921.  The 
agenda  of  the  Washington  conference  excluded  the  ques- 
tions uppermost  in  the  minds  of  Europeans.  But  the 
American  government  believed  that  if  a  start  were  made 
in  improving  international  relations  by  the  limitation  of 
naval  armaments  and  by  ending  for  a  time  the  possibility 
of  war  arising  from  causes  in  the  Far  East,  further  con- 
ferences would  deal  with  land  armaments  and  other  sources 
of  international  friction.  The  Washington  conference 
ended  on  February  6,  1922,  with  treaties  and  agreements 
to  its  credit  that  were  a  distinct  step  forward.^ 

In  the  meantime,  however,  the  Entente  powers  had  to 
continue  discussing  European  questions.  Premiers  Lloyd 
George  and  Briand  met  in  London  on  December  21,  1921, 
to  go  over  the  whole  field  of  German  disarmament,  repara- 
tions, and  the  economic  restoration  of  Europe.    A  week 

*See  Chapter  XLIX. 


CONFERENCES:  LONDON  TO  GENOA  (1919-1922)  559 

later,  at  a  meeting  of  the  French  and  British  financiers 
in  Paris,  a  corporation  was  organized  to  finance  the  resto- 
ration of  Europe,  to  whose  capital  the  United  States  and 
Germany  were  to  be  invited  to  subscribe  equally  with  Great 
Britain  and  France. 

On  January  6,  1922,  the  Entente  premiers,  the  Repara- 
tions Commission,  and  a  big  delegation  of  experts  met  at 
Cannes.  The  Germans  were  asked  to  come  to  Paris,  and 
hold  themselves  in  readiness  to  be  called  at  Cannes  if 
needed.  Lloyd  George  and  Briand  negotiated  a  defensive 
alliance  between  Great  Britain  and  France,  the  text  of 
which  had  hardly  been  agreed  upon  when  Briand  was  called 
back  to  Paris  to  meet  opposition  in  the  Chamber  of  Depu- 
ties that  led  to  his  resignation.  The  Reparations  Commis- 
sion agreed  to  a  provisional  delay  in  indemnity  payments, 
without  considering  Germany  in  default,  contingent  upon 
the  payment  of  31,000,000  gold  marks  every  ten  days. 
Although  they  refused  to  recognize  the  fact  officially,  the 
members  of  the  commission  realized  that  the  German  gov- 
ernment had  come  to  the  end  of  its  credits,  and  could  not 
be  expected  to  pay  the  annuities  imposed  by  the  ultimatum 
of  May,  1921.^  Upon  the  suggestion  of  Italy,  it  was  agreed 
that  a  general  conference  should  be  called  to  meet  at  Genoa 
in  the  first  week  of  March,  ''of  an  economic  and  financial 
nature,  of  all  the  European  powers,  Germany,  Austria, 
Hungary,  Bulgaria,  and  Russia  included."  The  opening 
date,  at  the  request  of  France,  was  postponed  until  April 
10.  The  United  States  was  also  invited,  but  declined  to 
participate  on  the  ground  that  the  conference  would  in- 
evitably deal  with  the  internal  political  problems  of  Europe, 
in  the  solution  of  which  the  United  States  did  not  propose 
to  become  involved. 

The  text  of  the  Anglo-French  treaty  provided  that  in 

*  Walter  Eathenau,  who  had  shown  more  willingness  than  most  German 
statesmen  to  meet  the  demands  of  the  Entente,  declared  that  Germany  could 
pay  500,000,000  gold  marks  in  cash  and  1,000,000,000  in  kind  annually,  but 
not  more.     This  amount  fell  far  short  of  the  Entente  figures. 


560         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

case  of  ''direct  and  unprovoked  aggression  against  the 
territory  of  France  by  Germany"  the  alliance  would  be- 
come operative;  that  Great  Britain  would  act  in  concert 
with  France  to  maintain  the  permanent  neutralization  of 
the  Rhineland,  and  also  to  prevent  Germany  from  taking 
military,  naval,  or  aerial  measures  incompatible  with  the 
treaty  of  Versailles.  The  treaty  was  to  run  for  ten  years, 
but  did  not  bind  any  of  the  dominions  of  the  British  Empire. 
The  alliance  was  bitterly  criticized  in  the  Chamber  of  Depu- 
ties, after  the  formation  of  a  new  ministry  under  former 
President  Poincare,  and  it  was  amended  to  make  the  guar- 
anty reciprocal.  It  was  argued  in  the  Chamber  that  the 
alliance  should  have  bound  Great  Britain  definitely  to  the 
French  policy  in  Poland  and  to  the  strict  execution  of  all 
the  terms  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles. 

France  went  to  Genoa  with  the  stipulation,  as  to  previous 
conferences,  that  the  revision  of  the  treaty  of  Versailles 
should  not  be  discussed,  and  that  there  should  be  no  recog- 
nition of  soviet  Eussia  that  did  not  provide  for  the  ac- 
knowledgment of  the  foreign  debt  of  czarist  Russia  by  her 
new  rulers. 


CHAPTER  XLIX 

THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE  AND  THE  LIMITATION 
OF  ARMAMENTS   (1921-1922) 

I  WAS  finding  that  putting  down  one's  impressions  of 
the  permanent  results  of  the  Washington  conference 
was  no  easy  task  when  my  twelve-year-old  burst  into  the 
room.  ^'I  want  you  to  read  my  history  paper,"  she  said. 
''The  teacher  gave  it  back  for  me  to  correct."  A  distracted 
eye  wandered  down  the  sheets  where  events  in  medieval 
history  were  summed  up  with  disconcerting  conciseness, 
and  suddenly  fell  upon  this  statement:  ''The  idea  was  a 
good  one,  but  they  tried  to  do  it  in  a  crazy  way."  This 
seemed  to  be  a  whole  answer.  "What  was  the  question, 
Christine  ? "  I  asked.  ' '  Oh,  they  wanted  to  know  all  about 
the  crusades." 

Centuries  from  now  school-children  may  dismiss  the 
American  crusade  for  limitation  of  armaments  in  one  illu- 
minating sentence.  They  will  have  the  advantage  of  per- 
spective and  of  being  unaffected  by  the  momentous  event. 
But  what  can  we  say  of  the  publicists  and  the  statesmen 
of  1922  who  make  use  of  Christine's  terseness  and  scorn 
to  consign  to  oblivion  the  Washington  conference?  Was 
it  an  episode  between  San  Remo  and  Cannes,  between  Spa 
and  Genoa!  Was  it  no  more  than  the  same  old  gang  in  a 
new  place,  filled  with  the  same  old  notions  and  going 
through  the  same  old  motions?  None  has  denied  that  the 
idea  was  a  good  one;  but  did  anything  come  of  it?  Will 
history  say  that  the  Washington  conference  accomplished 
the  objects  for  which  it  was  called?  The  well-being  of  the 
present  generation  throughout  the  world  depends  so  com- 
pletely upon  a  long  period  of  peace  that  we  can  not  afford 

561 


562         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

to  wait  for  the  proper  perspective  in  discussing  and 
attempting  to  estimate  the  results  of  the  Washington 
conference. 

In  the  first  place,  we  note  an  immediate  and  unqualified 
step  forward  in  bettering  international  relations ;  for  pub- 
lic opinion  in  the  most  heavily  armed  countries  admits,  in 
regard  to  the  proposal  to  limit  armaments,  that  ''the  idea 
is  a  good  one."    The  march  of  human  progress  is  never 
really  interrupted.    We  keep  moving,  most  of  the  time  at 
snail's  pace;  but  occasionally  there  is  a  jump.    It  is  curious 
that,  while  war  seems  to  breed  hatred  and  bitterness,  even 
among  allies,  the  inherent  good-will  of  mankind,  inhibited 
during  the   conflict,  shows  itself  in  overflowing  measure 
afterwards.    Pohticians,  striving  to  retain  their  leadership 
by  keeping  alive  war  passions,  are  out  of  tune  with  the 
sentiment  of  the  people,  and  if  they  do  not  change  their 
attitude  they  are  discarded.    Since  the  World  War  fishing 
in  troubled  waters  has  become  a  dangerous  sport,  and  only 
superficial  observers  believe  that  statesmen  who  dehber- 
ately  build  upon  the  foundation  of  hatred  and  suspicion  of 
their  nation  towards  other  nations  are  not  riding  for  a  fall. 
The  Paris  conference  assumed  the  permanence  of  cer- 
tain factors  in  the  world  situation  that  were  transient: 
hatred  of  Germany;  military  impotence  of  Germany;  lack 
of  dependence  of  German  industries  upon  private  initia- 
tive;  solidarity  of  interests  among  "the  Five  Principal 
;  Allied  and  Associated  Powers";  willingness  of  the  victori- 
ous peoples  to  give  their  lives  and  money  to  pursue  through- 
out the  world  policies  similar  to  those  that  Germany  had 
pursued.     Upon  these  false  assumptions  were  based  the 
treaty  of  Versailles  and  the  four  other  treaties;  and  the 
original  conception  of  the  League  of  Nations  was  modified 
under  their  influence.    But  it  was  soon  discovered  that  the 
peoples  who  had  fought  through  years,  sustained  by  the 
idea  that  they  could  make  the  world  a  decent  place  to  live  in, 
sincerely  wanted  what  they  had  fought  for.    They  refused 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE   (1921-1922)      563 

to  believe  that  there  is  no  substitute  for  force,  and  they 
were  apathetic  over  the  spoils  of  the  war.  The  statesmen 
thought,  or  at  all  events  said,  that  this  was  due  to  war 
weariness  and  burdens  of  taxation.  But  they  were  wrong. 
They  did  not  understand,  nor  could  they  break,  the  spell 
that  their  own  war  speeches  had  cast.  Had  they  not  told 
the  Germans  that  right  would  triumph  over  might?  Now 
that  Germany  was  vanquished,  were  not  the  victors  in 
a  position  to  cut  down  on  might  and  let  right  have  an 
inning  ? 

During  the  World  War  the  peoples  of  western  Europe 
and  America  had  come  to  look  upon  Germany  and  her  war 
lord  as  responsible  for  the  great  evils  in  international 
relations :  violating  treaties ;  bullying  weak  nations ;  deny- 
ing freedom  to  subject  peoples;  initiating  the  attempt  to 
partition  China;  seeking  colonial  aggrandizement  at  the 
expense  of  other  powers;  using  unfair  methods  in  inter- 
national commerce  and  the  carrying  trade ;  and  leading  the 
way  in  competitive  naval  and  land  armaments.  The  fact 
or  degree  of  Germany's  responsibility  for  these  evils  does 
not  enter  into  the  question.  What  matters  is  that  hun- 
dreds of  millions  were  brought  by  a  skilful  propaganda  to 
condemn  Germany  because  of  them.  The  propagandists 
had  in  mind,  in  giving  an  excellent  education  in  interna- 
tional affairs,  the  condemnation  of  Germany;  and  they 
probably  did  not  see  that  the  permanent  result  of  calling 
attention  to  the  evils  would  be  the  condemnation  of  the  evils 
themselves. 

The  men  who  imposed  upon  Germany  and  her  associates 
terms  of  peace  that  perpetuated  the  old  causes  for  wars 
and  created  new  ones  undoubtedly  believed  that  they  were 
expressing  the  just  resentment,  and  defending  and  advanc- 
ing the  interests,  of  their  respective  peoples.  Territories 
and  indemnities  and  economic  advantages  they  exacted 
from  the  defeated  nations  on  the  triple  plea  of  punish- 
ments, reparations,  and  guaranties.    But  they  bound  over 


564         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

their  enemies  to  keep  the  peace  without  promising  to  keep 
the  peace  themselves.  On  September  27,  1918,  President 
Wilson  summed  up  the  case  of  the  people  versus  their 
leaders  in  words  to  the  prophetic  character  of  which  his 
own  fate  bears  tragic  witness: 

**It  is  the  peculiarity  of  this  great  war  that,  while  states- 
men seemed  to  cast  about  for  definitions  of  their  purpose 
and  have  sometimes  seemed  to  shift  their  ground  and  their 
point  of  view,  the  thought  of  the  mass  of  men,  whom  states- 
men are  supposed  to  instruct  and  lead,  has  grown  more  and 
more  unclouded,  more  and  more  certain  of  what  it  is  that 
they  are  fighting  for.  National  purposes  have  fallen  more 
and  more  into  the  background;  and  the  common  purpose 
of  enlightened  mankind  has  taken  their  place.  The  coun- 
sels of  plain  men  have  become  more  simple  and  straight- 
forward and  more  unified  than  the  counsels  of  sophisticated 
men  of  affairs,  who  still  retain  the  impression  that  they 
are  playing  a  game  of  power  and  playing  for  high  stakes. 
That  is  why  I  have  said  that  this  is  a  people's  war,  not  a 
statesmen's.  Statesmen  must  follow  the  clarified  common 
thought  or  be  broken.  .  .  .  The  world  does  not  want  terms 
of  peace;  it  wishes  the  final  triumph  of  justice  and  fair 
dealing. ' ' 

At  Paris  the  Entente  statesmen  spoke  for  their  own 
nations,  and  had  in  mind  a  European  settlement ;  and  when 
problems  outside  Europe  were  before  them,  the  solutions 
they  proposed  were  suggested  by  the  sole  consideration 
of  how  certain  European  nations  were  to  benefit  by  them. 
This  is  why  Japanese  public  opinion  was  indifferent  to  the 
Paris  negotiations  and  settlements,  and  why  American  pub- 
lic opinion  received  without  enthusiasm  the  results  of  the 
Paris  deliberations,  repudiated  the  treaties,  and  refused  to 
join  the  League  of  Nations.  Had  we  not  entered  what  we 
thought  was  a  world  war  in  order  to  secure  a  world  peace  ? 
Mr.  Harding  and  his  advisers  did  not  misinterpret  the  sen- 
timent of  the  American  people.    The  willingness  to  cooper- 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE  (1921-1922)      565 

ate  with  the  rest  of  the  world  was  not  less  after  November 
2,  1920,  than  before.  The  call  to  the  Washington  confer- 
ence and  the  specific  proposals  of  Secretary  Hughes  for  the 
limitation  of  naval  armaments  expressed  the  eagerness  of 
the  United  States  to  make  a  fresh  effort  to  establish  a 
durable  world  peace. 

President  Harding  knew  how  to  ''follow  the  clarified 
common  thought"  better  than  President  Wilson  did. 
Ideology  does  not  long  hold  ''the  thought  of  the  mass  of 
men."  It  is  too  prolific,  too  complicated,  and  deals  too 
much  with  the  unknown  and  the  untried.  A  definite  plan 
for  attaining  a  concrete  object  will  receive  the  indorsement 
of  public  opinion  and  can  be  put  to  trial  with  a  prospect 
of  success ;  but  the  sponsorship  of  a  mass  of  ideas  does  not 
appeal  to  a  mass  of  men.  When  I  came  to  the  United 
States  in  the  summer  of  1919  to  follow  the  treaty  fight  at 
Washington,  I  put  before  my  young  son  for  his  first  meal 
in  New  York  dishes  dear  to  the  American  heart.  He  re- 
fused to  eat  most  of  them,  and  my  astonishment  was 
greatest  when  he  left  untouched  his  watermelon.  "It's 
good,  Lloyd,"  I  urged;  "do  try  to  eat  it."  He  shook  his 
head  with  finality.  "There  is  too  much  of  it,"  he  said. 
So  thought  the  American  people  about  the  treaty  of  Ver- 
sailles and  the  League  of  Nations,  and  so,  on  sober  second 
thought,  thought  they  about  Mr.  Wilson's  fourteen  points 
and  subsequent  discourses. 

The  invitation  to  the  Washington  conference  was  accom- 
panied by  the  proposed  agenda:  (1)  limitation  of  arma- 
ments and  (2)  problems  arising  from  the  changes  in  the 
balance  of  power  in  the  Pacific  and  the  Asiatic  countries 
bordering  on  the  Pacific.  It  was  intimated  in  diplomatic 
correspondence,  and  also  in  public  statements,  that  the 
practicable  basis  of  discussion  would  be  the  limitation  of 
the  naval  armaments  of  Great  Britain,  the  United  States, 
and  Japan,  and  that  it  was  for  this  reason  that  the  con- 
ference had  to  deal  with  problems  of  the  Pacific  and  of 


566        '  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

China.  The  fact  that  there  was  a  Washington  conference 
showed  that  President  Harding  and  his  associates  believed 
that  the  Paris  conference  had  failed  to  create  the  condi- 
tions and  the  machinery  that  would  lead  to  the  abandon- 
ment of  competitive  armaments.  It  proved,  too,  that  the 
statesmen  of  the  nations  associated  with  us  in  the  war  were 
convinced  that  the  United  States  was  an  indispensable 
factor  in  world  politics,  and  that  public  opinion  in  Entente 
countries  demanded  the  acceptance  of  the  American  offer 
to  make  an  effort  for  disarmament  outside  the  League  of 
Nations. 

Both  in  his  introductory  speech  on  November  12  and  in 
his  closing  speech  on  February  6,  however,  President  Hard- 
ing declared  that  the  transcendent  objects  of  the  conference 
were  to  pronounce  war  '^utterly  futile"  and  to  ''challenge 
the  sanity  of  competitive  preparation  for  each  other's  de- 
struction." The  method  of  achieving  this  was  to  be  *'a 
world  opinion  made  ready  to  grant  justice  precisely  as  it 
exacts  it."  And  he  added:  "Justice  is  better  served  in 
conferences  of  peace  than  in  conflicts  at  arms."  Here  we 
have  the  key-note  of  what  the  Washington  conference  at- 
tempted to  establish  as  a  new  guiding  principle  in  inter- 
national relations.  Because  experience  demonstrated  the 
"folly"  of  the  solution  of  international  differences  of  opin- 
ion by  arms  and  the  "utter  futility"  of  war,  diplomacy 
should  adopt  the  preventive  measure  of  settling  disputes 
in  conferences  among  the  interested  powers.  But  a  con- 
ference must  be  "ready  to  grant  justice  precisely  as  it 
exacts  it."  ^ 

While  admitting  that  "the  idea  was  a  good  one,"  cor- 
respondents and  editorial  writers  have  by  no  means 
agreed  that  the  conference  was  a  success.  The  hyper- 
critical and  the  cynical  and  the  satirical  have  advanced 

^  The  Harding  program  at  the  Washington  conference  demanded  justice 
for  China,  for  example,  as  a  means  of  compounding  the  rivalry  among  the 
powers  over  China. 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE  (1921-1922)      567 

different  grounds  on  which  to  affirm  that  the  conference  did 
not  get  beyond  the  point  of  agreeing  that  the  limitation  of 
armaments  is  a  good  idea.  We  are  told  that  the  experts 
of  the  leading  naval  powers  recognized  that  the  day  of 
capital  ships  has  passed,  and  that  limitation  of  capital 
ships,  even  though  it  meant  scrapping  new  ships,  would 
have  no  serious  effect  upon  the  naval  strength  of  the  powers 
concerned.  At  the  same  time,  the  governments  were  saved 
the  embarrassment  of  finding  large  sums  of  money  to  build 
implements  of  war  of  whose  efficacy  they  were  in  doubt. 
When  it  came  to  smaller  craft,  which  may  again  come  into 
favor  because  they  can  more  easily  evade  the  torpedoes  of 
submarines  and  the  bombs  of  airplanes,  there  was  no  agree- 
ment. And  how  can  we  talk  about  a  fixed  ratio  of  naval 
strength  when  we  have  no  means  of  checking  up  on  one 
another  in  the  construction  of  airplanes  and  submarines 
whose  value  in  naval  warfare  is  still  xl  As  for  poison 
gases  and  rules  of  maritime  warfare,  the  shades  of  the  two 
Hague  conferences  and  the  declaration  of  London  haunt 
us.  And  see  how^  pleased  the  Chinese  are  over  the  four- 
power  treaty!  The  agreements  among  the  powers  con- 
cerning Morocco,  Persia,  Siam,  Korea,  Egypt,  and  China 
have  always  started  out  with  a  preamble  about  the  main- 
tenance of  '' independence  and  integrity." 

But  there  is  a  radical  difference  between  the  Washington 
conference  and  the  international  assemblies  with  which  the 
comparisons  are  made.    Are  we  not  justified  in  entertain- 
ing the  reasonable  hope  that  the  Washington  conference,  \j^f^ 
after  many  disappointments,  was  the  beginning  of  a  new      ■■ 
era  in  international  relations? 

The  Hague  conferences  were  held  at  a  time  when  govern- 
ments had  academic  notions,  and  public  opinion  no  notions 
at  all,  about  the  horrors,  the  loss  of  life,  the  financial 
burden,  the  destruction  of  values,  and  the  economic  dis- 
asters of  twentieth-century  warfare.  We  had  not  yet  bowed 
down  ourselves  to  and  served  our  Frankensteins  in  heaven 


568         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

above,  or  in  the  earth  beneath,  or  in  the  water  under  the 
earth.  At  Paris  in  1919  the  war  was  still  too  close  upon 
us  for  any  other  thought  to  prevail  than  that  of  punishing 
our  enemies,  reimbursing  ourselves  for  our  losses,  and 
rewarding  ourselves  for  having  won  the  war.  When  re- 
minded that  we  had  claimed  to  be  fighting  a  war  to  end 
war,  we  were  ready  to  bring  this  great  object  into  harmony 
with  the  gratification  of  our  resentment  and  of  our  desire 
for  spoils  by  asserting  that  peace  would  be  secure  when  the 
vanquished  (and  those  who  contemplated  their  fate) 
learned  that  war  did  not  pay. 

During  the  three  years  between  the  collapse  of  Germany 
and  the  opening  of  the  Washington  conference  the  victors 
also  learned  that  war  did  not  pay,  that  world  peace  could 
not  be  built  upon  punitive  treaties,  and  that  the  elimination 
of  Germany  from  world  politics  and  her  disarmament  did 
not  do  away  with  international  crises  arising  from  im- 
perialistic ambitions  and  with  competitive  armaments. 
This  was  no  surprise  to  statesmen  of  the  old  school;  they 
had  not  expected  the  game  to  stop  when  Germany  dropped 
out.  But  it  was  a  surprise  to  the  ''masses  of  men."  Pub- 
lic opinion  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  in  the  British 
dominions,  and  in  Japan  demanded  that  an  honest  trial  be 
made  of  the  conference  idea  to  settle  disputes  and  to  put 
an  end  to  competitive  armaments.  The  conviction  behind 
this  demand  made  itself  felt  at  Washington  throughout  the 
conference.  Day  after  day  there  rang  in  the  ears  of  the 
delegates  the  fiat  of  public  opinion  in  the  form  of  a  judg- 
ment, a  plea,  and  a  warning.  The  ''clarified  common 
thought"  was  this: 

"We  now  know  that  war  is  too  horrible  to  be  considered 
soberly  and  deliberately  prepared  for. 

"Another  war  may  mean  the  end  of  civilization. 

"Do  not  count  on  us  to  give  our  lives  and  our  money  to 
settle  international  disputes  by  fighting. 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE   (1921-1922)       569 

**The  defeat  of  Germany  and  the  terms  of  peace  imposed 
upon  her  and  her  allies  have  not  removed  the  old  causes 
of  war. 

**Now,  you  statesmen  do  something  about  it;  you  will 
have  to  succeed  by  conference,  or  we  shall  turn  to  other 
leaders." 


When  we  realize  that  the  conferees  at  Washington  acted 
under  the  impulsion  of  public  opinion,  unique  in  its  enlight- 
enment and  its  determination,  we  see  how  absurd  is  the 
attempt  of  critics  to  throw  cold  water  upon  this  conference 
by  invoking  the  failures  of  previous  conferences.  I  went 
to  Washington  in  a  skeptical  frame  of  mind,  and,  after  the 
initial  impression  of  the  simple  ceremony  at  Arlington  and 
of  the  dramatic  opening  session  of  the  conference  wore  off, 
my  skepticism  returned.  I  had  attended  so  many  con- 
ferences where  noble  declarations  of  purpose  had  proved 
irrelevant  to  the  business  in  hand  or  had  become  denatured 
in  the  bitter  conflict  of  divergent  ambitions  that  I  lost 
two  good  months  in  trying  to  satisfy  myself  that  I  had 
been  right  in  predicting  failure.  But  the  statesmen  did  not 
run  true  to  form!  Confronted  by  Secretary  Hughes  with 
the  principle  of  compromise  in  renunciation,  the  time- 
honored  principle  of  compromise  in  aggrandizement  was 
abandoned.  Then  it  dawned  upon  me  that  a  new  era  in 
international  relations  had  begun.  The  World  War  had 
been  a  cataclysm,  and  mankind  had  learned  a  lesson.  Once 
more  in  a  great  crisis  the  masses  of  men  proved  to  be  the 
masters  of  men. 

Will  the  new  era  materialize?  Many  good  things  get  a 
start  and  somehow  are  nipped  in  the  bud.  Few  converted 
in  revivals  stick;  and  when  the  devil  is  sick,  becoming  a 
monk  is  not  an  unattractive  suggestion.  The  memory  of 
the  horrors  of  the  war  will  grow  dim ;  a  new  generation  of 
potential  fighting-men  will  be  ready  to  try  its  hand  at  the 
fascinating  and  glorious  game  of  its  fathers ;  and  the  money 


570         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  "WORLD  POLITICS 

squandered  between  1914  and  1922  will  be  paid  off  or  writ- 
ten off.  *  *  Men  will  fight, ' '  you  are  sententiously  reminded, 
"and  you  can't -change  human  nature.  Look  at  the  chil- 
dren in  your  own  nursery,  and  the  next  time  they  all  set 
up  a  yell  at  once,  just  use  common  sense,  and  admit  that 
nations  are  like  children.  If  they  have  nothing  to  fight 
about,  they  will  invent  reasons;  and  if  they  have  no 
weapons,  they  will  make  them." 

This  is  the  argument  of  the  man  who  is  half  baked  in 
his  knowledge  of  both  history  and  human  nature,  and  it  is 
precisely  because  he  is  allowed  to  get  away  with  fallacious 
half-truths  that  public  opinion  in  civilized  countries  did  not 
long  ago  put  an  end  to  the  caveman  and  outlaw  conception 
of  international  relations.  In  the  forests  of  Germany  our 
ancestors  used  to  lie  in  wait  for  one  another  with  stone 
axes,  and  every  man  carried  his  with  him.  The  population 
did  not  increase  fast.  But  the  more  we  perfected  our 
weapons  the  less  ready  we  were  to  use  them.  We  com- 
bined, forming  communities  and  nations,  so  that  we  would 
not  have  to  be  thinking  about  our  security  all  the  time,  but 
could  delegate  the  fighting  business  to  those  who  liked  that 
sort  of  thing.  Instead  of  being  a  succession  of  wars  and  a 
constant  appeal  to  force,  the  progress  of  civilization  is  the 
steady  development  of  the  substitution  of  reason  for  force 
in  human  relationships.  The  history  of  our  own  country 
strikingly  illustrates  the  determination  of  men  to  make 
security  of  life  and  property  depend  upon  the  reign  of  law 
and  not  upon  the  agility  of  the  individual  with  his  six- 
shooter.  The  wild  west  disappeared  as  soon  as  men  by 
common  consent  were  organized  *^to  grant  justice  precisely 
as  they  exacted  it." 

The  scramble  of  European  nations  for  world  markets 
was  prompted  by  a  miraculous  development  of  industries 
and  means  of  transportation.  When  the  European  peoples 
began  to  think  that  security  -and  prosperity  were  contin- 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE   (1921-1922)       571 

gent  upon  beating  the  other  fellow  to  it  all  over  the  world, 
and  that  the  only  means  of  doing  this  was  the  use  of 
superior  force  against  Asiatic  and  African  peoples  and 
also  against  one  another,  primitive  human  nature  reas- 
serted itself.  Colonial  rivalry  was  the  prelude  to  the  danse 
macabre  of  the  bayonet-pierced,  the  bullet-ridden,  the  shell- 
torn,  the  gassed,  and  the  influenza-  and  famine-stricken 
from  Flanders  to  the  steppes  of  Russia.  Conscription, 
airplanes,  submarines,  and  long-range  guns  brought  the 
world  back  to  the  Stone  Age :  each  man  was  lying  in  wait 
for  his  neighbor. 

A  French  journalist  shook  his  head  when  he  saw  Presi- 
dent Harding  leading  his  people  in  the  Lord's  Prayer  at 
Arlington  Cemetery.  "C'est  toujours  la  meme  chose! 
Voire  Harding  est  un  pasteiir  protestant  comme  V autre." 
Within  twenty-four  hours  he  shook  his  head  again  at 
Memorial  Hall,  and  added  Hughes  to  his  hst  of  Protestant 
pastors  who  seemed  to  be  in  charge  of  American  foreign 
policy.  Mr.  Harding,  appealing  to  God,  put  himself  in  Mr. 
Wilson's  class;  while  Mr.  Hughes,  calmly  offering  to  scrap 
battle-ships  and  asking  the  other  powers  to  follow  suit, 
outwilsoned  Wilson  and  outhardinged  Harding.  My 
French  colleague  had  written  glowing  editorials  before  the 
conference  predicting  a  deadlock  between  the  United  States 
and  Great  Britain  on  the  naval  question  and  between  the 
United  States  and  Japan  on  the  Chinese  question.  France, 
he  pointed  out,  would  play  the  profitable  Bismarckian  role 
of  honest  broker.  Go-between  and  arbiter,  France  would 
help  the  three  powers  in  turn  to  advance  their  particular 
interests,  and  as  a  reward  they  would  all  agree  to  let  France 
have  what  she  wanted.  Wilson  had  proved  an  impossible 
man  to  deal  with,  for  he  had  honestly  striven  for  peace 
and  not  for  the  aggrandizement  of  the  United  States.  It 
was  a  shock  to  find  Harding  and  Hughes  taking  it  for 
granted  that  the  other  powers  had  come  to  Washington  to 


572         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

act  together  for  the  common  weaL  A  new  spirit  must  pre- 
vail and  a  new  language  must  be  learned.  A  new  spirit 
did  prevail  and  a  new  language  tvas  learned.^ 

It  was  hard  for  statesmen  trained  to  measure  success  by 
aggrandizement  to  think  of  success  in  the  terms  of  renun- 
ciation. The  first  steps  were  falteringiy  and  reluctantly 
taken.  But  the  fact  remains  that  they  were  taken.  The 
5-5-3-1.75-1.75  ratio  for  capital  ships  agreed  upon  among 
the  naval  powers,  which  puts  an  end  for  ten  years  to  com- 
petitive naval  construction  and  entails  the  scrapping  of 
ships  already  launched  or  building,  is  a  precedent  of  ines- 
timable value,  as  is  the  surrender  of  leases  in  China. 
Avaunt  the  critics  who  tell  us  that  these  decisions  mean 
nothing  or  who  beUttle  their  importance  by  pointing  out 
that  they  do  not  go  far  enough !  Each  figure  is  the  result 
of  a  genuine  sacrifice  on  the  part  of  the  power  that  accepted 
it,  a  sacrifice  of  a  kind  that  has  never  before  been  willingly 
made  in  an  international  conference.  The  United  States 
swallowed  her  pride  when  she  renounced  the  largest  navy 
in  the  world,  which  was  within  her  grasp;  Great  Britain 
when  she  renounced  the  supremacy  of  the  sea,  which  she 
had  held  for  centuries;  Japan  when  she  renounced  the 

*None  of  the  treaties  went  as  far  as  had  been  hoped;   but,  despite  the 
'    necessity  for  constant  compromise,  each  one   established  a  new  principle  in 
international  relations   and  opened   the   way   for   further   negotiations.      The 
treaties  recommended  by  the  Washington  conference  were: 

(1)  A  five-power  treaty  involving  the  scrapping  of  sixty-eight  capital  ships, 
the  restriction  of  the  tonnage  of  navies  and  of  fortification  in  the  Far  East, 
and  a  ten-year  naval  holiday. 

(2)  A  five-power  treaty  outlawing  the  use  of  submarines  as  an  agency 
of  attack  on  merchant -ships  and  prohibiting  the  use  of  poison  gas. 

J       .  (3)   A  nine-power  treaty   stabilizing   the   conditions  in  the  Far   East  and 

' "' '  reiterating  the  open-door  principle  in  regard  to  China. 

(4)  A  nine -power  treaty  making  a  beginning  of  the  division  of  Chinese 
customs,  abolishing  foreign  post-offices,  and  releasing  the  Chinese  govern- 
ment from  the  obligation  to  keep  funds  lying  idle  in  foreign  banks. 

(5)  A  four-power   treaty   binding   the   principal   Pacific   powers   to  respect 
/,         one  another's  territory  in  the  Pacific  and  to   confer  when  the  peace  of  the 

Pacific  is  threatened   (abrogating  the  existing  Anglo- Japanese  treaty). 

(6)  Agreement  between  Japan  and  China  for  the  restoration  of  the  German 
lease  in  Shantung,  coupled  with  declaration  of  the  willingness  of  Great  Britain 

/ ,         to  renounce  the  lease  of  Wei-Hai-Wei  and  of  France  to  renounce  the  lease  of 
Kwang-Chau-Wan. 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE  (1921-1922)      573 

completion  of  a  ship-building  program  that  the  nation  had 
been  taught  to  believe  was  indispensable  to  its  dignity  and 
security;  France  when  she  renounced  the  privilege  of  ever 
attempting  to  regain  the  glory  that  was  hers  before  Tra- 
falgar ;  and  Italy  when  she  renounced  making  a  bid  for  the 
naval  supremacy  of  the  Mediterranean,  which  was  a  rea- 
sonable and  feasible  hope.  It  is  beside  the  mark  to  explain 
these  renunciations  by  stating  that  they  represent  the 
acknowledgment  of  an  inevitable  situation  on  the  part  of 
all  the  powers  except  the  United  States.  The  statesmen 
were  guided  by  realities  and  not  by  force  majeure.  Fore- 
most among  these  realities  were  the  impossibiUty  of  in- 
creasing taxation  and  the  improbability  of  a  new  war  bene- 
fiting any  one.  Pride  yielded  to  common  sense  because  all 
the  powers  were  willing  to  sacrifice. 

If  we  were  able  to  give  reasons  for  believing  that  the 
Washington  decisions  will  not  serve  as  precedents  and  to 
assert  that  the  Washington  conference  was  an  isolated  in- 
ternational gathering,  we  should  be  justified  in  regarding 
it  as  a  triumph  of  the  English-speaking  peoples  in  a  con- 
spiracy to  get  an  international  acknowledgment  of  their 
world-wide  hegemony  and  therefore  be  quit  of  the  burden 
of  having  to  hold  by  force  what  they  had  gained  by  force. 
And  we  should  be  justified  in  suspecting  that  Japan  will 
interpret  the  agreements  as  giving  her  a  free  hand  in 
Siberia  and  in  northern  and  central  China.  But  did  not 
President  Harding  declare  that  the  decisions  were  prece- 
dents and  that  the  Washington  conference  was  the  begin- 
ning of  a  new  method  of  settling  international  disputes? 
Mr.  Harding  still  has  three  years,  and  probably  seven,  in 
an  office  that  gives  him  the  greatest  power  in  the  world  as 
an  initiator  of  plans  for  international  undertakings. 
When  other  questions — perhaps  some  of  the  unsolved  ques- 
tions of  Washington — become  acute  and  disturb  the  rela- 
tions between  powers,  will  not  the  matters  at  issue  be 
threshed  out  in  a  conference  among  all  the  powers  affected 


674         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

by  them?  If  we  give  reason  a  chance,  reason  will  prevail 
over  force. 

Whether  the  naval  experts  are  in  favor  of  capital  ships 
or  suggest  the  multiplication  of  other  means  of  defense 
and  offense,  the  scrapping  of  ships  already  built  and  the 
naval  holiday  of  ten  years  will  make  exceedingly  difficult 
the  resumption  of  naval  construction.  Unless  the  next  ten 
years  fail  to  create  ' '  a  world  opinion  made  ready  to  grant 
justice  precisely  as  it  exacts  it,"  public  opinion  will  de- 
mand the  renewal  of  an  agreement  that  saves  so  much 
money,  and,  having  gotten  out  of  the  habit  of  voting  huge 
naval  budgets,  parhaments  will  fight  shy  of  the  responsi- 
bilities involved  in  abandoning  the  five-power  treaty.  On 
the  other  hand,  if  this  world  opinion  is  created,  the  limi- 
tation of  naval  armaments  will  be  followed  rapidly  by  the 
limitation  of  land  armaments. 

But  the  conditional  clause  is  all-important.  The  use  of 
force  to  maintain  law  and  order  meets  with  universal  ap- 
proval, and  society  has  developed  the  unconscious  instinct 
of  siding  with  the  agents  of  law  and  order.  Moving-picture 
audiences  may  laugh  at  policemen,  but  if  you  have  ever 
been  arrested  you  know  how  instinctively  hostile  to  the 
prisoner  is  the  crowd.  But  the  application  of  force  is  occa- 
sional and  incidental  in  well  ordered  society,  and  the  maj- 
esty of  the  law  does  not  depend  upon  the  numbers  of  those 
who  enforce  it  and  the  quality  of  their  weapons.  Mass 
resistance  of  the  law  rarely,  if  ever,  occurs,  except  when 
there  has  been  an  abuse  of  force.  If  those  who  hold  in 
their  hands  power  and  wealth  act  fairly  and  decently,  they 
do  not  need  to  arm  to  the  teeth  to  make  secure  from  attack 
their  persons  and  their  possessions.  And  even  if  they  are 
unfair  and  indecent,  they  can  go  pretty  far  before  some  one 
up  and  whacks  them. 

Why  do  international  relations  have  to  be  different  from 
internal  relations?  Beyond  a  police  force  to  deal  with 
malefactors,  we  provide  no  means  for  making  secure  our 


THE  WASHINGTON  CONFERENCE  (1921-1922)      575 

lives  and  possessions.  We  presuine  that  the  people  we 
meet  are  not  thugs.  Although  thugs  exist,  we  do  not  arm 
ourselves  when  we  go  for  a  walk,  and  few  of  us  have  fire- 
arms in  our  homes.  Wliy  do  nations  have  to  think  of  one 
another  as  thugs  and  provide  means  of  defense  accord- 
ingly? We  have  come  to  this  sorry  pass  in  international 
relations  because  we  have  been  like  dogs  fighting  over 
bones  or  pigs  with  both  feet  in  the  trough,  unable  to  drink 
all  the  swill  ourselves  but  with  teeth  sharp  enough  to  keep 
other  pigs  out.  The  study  of  world  politics  proves  that  the 
amazing  development  of  land  armies  by  conscription  and 
of  competitive  naval  construction  has  followed  the  overseas 
expansion  of  Europe. 

To  have  and  to  hold  was  the  motto  of  European  diplo- 
macy that  led  the  way  to  Armageddon.  Titles  were  gained 
by  force  and  maintained  by  force.  One  war-ship,  landing 
a  few  sailors  or  marines,  staked  out  a  title.  The  deed  was 
written  and  recorded  by  a  punitive  expedition.  The  prop- 
erty was  developed  by  an  army,  which  became  a  permanent 
garrison,  and  whose  means  of  communication  with  the 
home-land  had  to  be  guarded  by  an  ever-increasing  fleet. 
Is  it  possible  for  the  European  powers,  the  United  States, 
and  Japan  to  continue  to  hold  by  any  other  means  than 
force  what  was  won  by  force?  And  does  not  history  teach 
us  that  every  colonial  power,  after  it  has  made  a  colony 
or  a  protectorate  by  ''pacifying"  and  extending  its  admin- 
istrative control  over  a  weaker  and  therefore  supposedly 
inferior  people,  has  been  apprehensive  of  hostile  inten- 
tions on  the  part  of  other  colonial  powers? 

The  abandonment  of  predatory  foreign  policies,  well 
begun  by  the  renunciation  of  leases  in  China,  is  a  pre- 
requisite to  permanent  limitation  of  armaments.  This  will 
certainly  be  accomplished  if  the  people  can  be  made  to  see 
that  economic  imperialism  has  not  paid  expenses,  and  that 
large  armies  and  navies  never  have  had  raison  d'etre  ex- 
cept as  instruments  of  aggression.    When  the  governments 


576         AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  WORLD  POLITICS 

of  the  great  powers  make  up  their  minds  to  use  the  same 
standards  of  conduct  in  dealing  with  other  peoples  that 
they  have  long  used  in  dealing  with  their  own  people,  all 
the  world  can  let  everything  go  in  land  and  naval  arma- 
ments beyond  the  police  forces.  The  way  initiated  at 
Washington  was  a  ''crazy  way"  of  working  towards 
world  peace  only  if  the  reign  of  law  and  order  through- 
out the  world  is  not  what  twentieth-century  civilization  is 
striving  for. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A  COMPLETE  list  of  source  and  secondary  materials  for  the 
study  of  world  politics  would  make  a  volume  in  itself.  What 
I  believed  to  be  a  brief  list,  with  brief  comments,  was  compiled ; 
but  I  find  myself  compelled  to  prune  it  down.  Consequently,  I 
have  limited  my  bibliography  to  books  that  are  actually  on  the 
shelves  of  my  own  library,  and  to  which  I  have  referred  in  writing 
this  Introduction  to  World  Politics.  Not  all  of  the  books  that  were 
consulted  axe  listed,  but  only  those  which  it  is  believed  will  be  of 
assistance  to  the  general  mass  of  students  in  this  field.  Original 
sources — official  parliamentary  papers  and  collections  of  documents 
and  correspondence  issued,  or  whose  publication  has  been  author- 
ized, by  the  various  governments — are  omitted. 

WORKING  MATERIALS 

For  maps  I  use  The  Times  Survey  Atlas  and  Gazetteer  of  the 
World  (London,  1921),  which  is  the  most  complete  atlas,  both  as 
to  maps  and  as  to  index  of  names,  that  has  yet  been  published.  It 
contains  a  transparent  indexing  frame,  which  enables  one  to  put  his 
finger  immediately  upon  any  of  the  hundred  squares  into  which 
each  page  is  divided  for  reference.  Occasionally  I  find  it  necessary 
to  refer  to  E.  Ambrosius,  Andrees  Allgemeiner  Handatlas  (Leip- 
zig, 1914),  whose  excellent  Namenverzeichnis  is  in  a  very  handy 
separate  volume.  The  best  small  atlas  published  since  the  war  is 
Putnam's  Handy  Volume  Atlas  of  the  World  (New  York,  1921), 
which  contains  the  latest  census  figures  of  population,  and  indicates 
on  the  maps  the  changes  made  by  the  treaties  of  1919  and  1920. 

For  chronology  I  have  depended  upon  W.  H.  Tillinghast  (ed. 
and  trans.),  Ploetz'  Manual  of  Universal  History  (Boston,  1915)  ; 
G.  P.  and  G.  H.  Putnam,  Handbook  of  Universal  History  (New 
York,  1919)  ;  A.  Hassall,  European  History  Chronologically  Ar- 
ranged (London,  1920) ;  A.  Hassall,  British  History  Chronologi- 
cally Arranged  (London,  1920),  and  Chronology  of  the  War  (Lon- 
don, 1918-20),  3  vols,  and  atlas.  This  last  publication  was  issued 
under  the  auspices  of  the  British  Ministry  of  Information,  and  is 

577 


578  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

copiously  indexed  at  the  end  of  each  year.  It  ^ves  the  war  day  by 
day  from  June  23,  1914,  to  December  31,  1918,  and  contains  a  brief 
chronology  for  1919 ;  there  are  valuable  notes,  tables,  and  appen- 
dices. 

For  general  reference  I  find  indispensable  The  Annual  Register 
(London,  1756-1921),  and  Sir  J.  S.  Keltic,  The  .Statesman's  Y ear- 
Book  (London),  which  is  revised  annually.  I  have  a  complete  set 
of  The  Annual  Register,  and  find  in  it  the  material  that  I  have 
failed  to  get  from  other  sources.  It  is  fairly  well  indexed,  and 
carries  a  sufficiently  full  record  of  parliamentary  debates  and  news- 
paper comments  for  reference  purposes.  Similarly,  The  States- 
man's Y ear-Book  contains  statistics,  revised  annually,  and  the 
latest  information  concerning  governmental  changes,  treaties,  etc. 
Each  year  there  are  several  interesting  maps,  giving  recent  changes. 
However,  The  Encyclopcedia  Britannica  (11th  ed.  and  including 
three  new  volumes  published  in  1922),  owing  to  its  unrivaled  index, 
should  always  be  at  hand.  For  detailed  information  concerning  the 
international  relations  of  European,  African,  and  Asiatic  countries 
and  dependencies,  and  international  canals,  congresses,  schemes  for 
peace,  etc.,  the  162  Handbooks  Prepared  under  the  Direction  of  the 
Historical  Section  of  the  Foreign  Office  (London,  1920)  are  excel- 
lent. They  do  not  cover  the  entire  world,  however,  and  are  of  un- 
even merit.  The  China  Year-Book,  The  Japan  Year-Book,  the 
French  Annuaire  Colonial,  and  The  New  York  World  Almanac  oc- 
casionally help  one  out  when  other  sources  fail.  From  1914  to  1920 
inclusive,  The  Times  Diary  and  Index  of  the  War  (London,  1921), 
referring  to  The  Times  History  of  the  War,  22  vols.  (London,  1915- 
1921),  is  the  best  aid  to  quick  reference  I  know  of,  if  one  has  on  his 
shelves  a  complete  Times  set.  The  New  York  Times  Current  His- 
tory, which  has  been  published  monthly  since  August,  1914,  con- 
tains a  very  good  diary  of  events,  and  the  texts  of  agreements  and 
treaties,  as  well  as  of  the  most  important  speeches  made  by  states- 
men during  the  war  and  the  peace  negotiations. 

For  problems  of  international  law,  I  use  G.  B.  Davis,  The  Ele- 
ments of  International  Law  (New  York,  1915),  the  fourth  ed.,  re- 
vised by  G.  E.  Sherman ;  E.  C.  Stowell  and  H.  F.  Munro,  Interna- 
tional Cases  (Boston,  1916),  2  vols.;  and  L.  Oppenheim,  Interna- 
tional Law  (London,  1920-21),  2  vols.,  third  ed.,  edited  by  R.  F. 
Roxburgh. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  579 

INTERNATIONAL  RELATIONS    BEFORE   1878 
(Chapters  1,  2,  3) 

Sir  Edward  Hertslet,  The  Map  of  Europe  ly  Treaty,  revised  ed., 
4  vols,  (London,  1891),  is  the  best  reference  work.  The  founda- 
tion of  the  world  order  of  the  nineteenth  century  is  given  exhaus- 
tively by  Comte  d'Angeberg  in  Le  Congres  de  Vienne  et  les 
Traites  de  1815  (Paris,  1864)  and  succinctly  and  critically  by 
W.  A.  Phillips  in  The  Confederation  of  Europe  (London,  1914). 

D.  P.  Heatley,  Diplomacy  and  the  Study  of  International  Relations 
(Oxford,  1919),  and  E.  Lipson,  Europe  in  the  Nineteenth  Century 
(London,  1916),  have  written  illuminating  studies  from  the  view- 
point of  world  politics,  while  P.  S.  Reinsch's  World  Politics  at  the 
End  of  the  Nineteenth  Century  (New  York,  1919)  blazed  the  trail 
for  American  writers.  Other  suggestive  books  are :  C.  Dupuis,  Le 
Principe  d'Equilibre  et  le  Concert  Europeen  (Paris,  1909)  ;  and 

E.  H,  Sears,  JLw  Outline  of  Political  Growth  in  the  Nineteenth  Cen- 
tury (New  York,  1900).  For  general  reference,  the  most  satisfac- 
tory accounts  of  diplomatic  events  are  found  in  A.  Debidour,  His- 
toire  diplomatique  de  I'Europe,  4  vols.  (Paris,  1891-1917),  and  A. 
Stern,  Geschichte  Europas  seit  den  Vertrdgen  von  1815  his  zum 
Frankfurter  Freiden  von  1871,  of  which  six  volumes  were  pub- 
lished up  to  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  reaching  only  the  Revolution 
of  1848.  I  have  on  my  shelves,  and  acknowledge  my  indebtedness 
to,  the  general  histories  of  the  period  written  by  Professors  C.  Seig- 
nobos,  C.  M.  Andrews,  J.  H.  Robinson  and  C.  A.  Beard,  C.  D. 
Hazen,  L.  H.  Holt  and  A.  W.  Chilton,  C.  J.  H.  Hayes,  J.  S.  Seha- 
piro,  W.  A.  PhiUips,  J.  H.  Rose,  and  F.  Schevill. 

THE  NEAR   EASTERN   QUESTION 
(Chapters  3,  6,  7,  13,  18,  20,  21,  22,  23,   26,  39,  40,  48) 

The  two  outstanding  reference  volumes  are:  E.  Driault,  La 
Question  d'Orient  (Paris,  1914),  and  J.  A.  R.  Marriott,  The  East- 
ern Question  (Oxford,  1917).  G.  Yakchitch,  L'Europe  et  la 
Resurrection  de  la  Serhie:  1804-1834  (Paris,  1917),  gives  an  excel- 
lent account  of  how  Europe  was  drawn  into  the  Balkan  difficulties ; 
and  Sir  T.  H.  Holdich,  B&undaries  in  Europe  and  the  Near  East 
(London,  1918),  has  summed  up  the  territorial  developments  and 


580  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

changes.  The  Near  Eastern  question  is  covered  in  detail  by  Debi- 
dour,  and  more  summarily  by  Seignobos  and  the  American  text- 
book writers  cited  above.  On  particular  phases  of  the  question, 
among  a  host  of  volumes  are  worth  singling  out  De  Freycinet,  La 
Question  d'Egypte  (Paris,  1905)  ;  D.  G.  Hogarth,  The  Nearer  East 
(London,  1901)  ;  T.  G.  Djuvara,  Cent  pro  jets  de  Partage  de  la 
Turquie  (Paris,  1914)  ;  Lord  Eversley,  The  Turkish  Empire:  Its 
Growth  and  Decay  (London,  1917)  ;  H.  N.  Brailsford,  Macedonia, 
Its  Races  and  Their  Future  (London,  1906)  ;  and  R.  W.  Seton-Wat- 
son.  The  Rise  of  Nationality  in  the  Balkans  (London,  1917).  Re- 
cent and  present  problems  are  treated  by  H.  A.  Gibbons,  The  New 
Map  of  Europe  (New  York,  1914) ;  A.  Mandelstam,  Le  Sort  de 
L'Empire  Ottoman  (Lausanne,  1917)  ;  M.  Jastrow,  The  War  and 
the  Bagdad  Railway  (Philadelphia,  1916)  ;  N.  Buxton  and  C.  L. 
Leese,  Balkan  Problems  and  European  Peace  (London,  1919) ;  L. 
Maccas,  L'Hellenisme  de  V Asia-Mine%ire  (Paris,  1919)  ;  P.  Hibben, 
Constantine  I.  and  the  Greek  People  (New  York,  1917) ;  and  H.  A. 
Gibbons,  Yenizelos  (in  the  Modern  Statesmen  Series,  Boston,  1920). 
Three  Balkan  premiers  have  given  personal  testimony  of  recent 
events:  I.  E.  Gueshoif,  The  Balkan  League  (London,  1915);  E. 
Venizelos,  The  Vindication  of  Greek  National  Policy:  1912-1917 
(London,  1918),  and  T.  Jonescu,  Origins  of  the  War  (London, 
1917),  and  Some  Personal  Impressions  (New  York,  1920). 

THE  FAB,  EASTERN  QUESTION 
(Cliapters  9,   10,   11,   12,   27,   28,   43,  44,  45,  47,  40) 

The  relations  between  Europe  and  the  Far  East  are  treated  by 
Debidour  and  the  other  authorities  given  above,  and  the  role  of  the 
different  powers,  including  Japan  and  the  United  States,  is  dis- 
cussed in  the  books  listed  under  the  foreign  policy  and  colonial 
expansion  of  each  of  these  powers.  The  outstanding  work  on  the 
Far  Eastern  question  is  H.  B.  Morse,  The  International  Relations 
of  the  Chinese  Empire,  3  vols.  (London,  1918).  T.  F.  Millard,  Our 
Eastern  Question  (New  York,  1916),  and  N.  J.  Bau,  The  Foreign 
Relations  of  China  (New  York,  1921),  give  the  Chinese  point  of 
view.  I  have  found  of  value  K.  S.  Latourette,  The  Development  of 
China  (New  York,  1918)  ;  and  G.  Maspero,  La  Chine  (Paris,  1919). 
The  last  decade  is  summed  up  in  B,  L.  Putnam  Weale's  The  Fight 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  581 

for  the  Republic  in  China  (London,  1918).  From  the  anti-imperi- 
alist point  of  view,  the  history  of  the  last  half-century  is  sum- 
marized and  commented  upon  by  H.  M.  Hyndman,  The  Awakening 
of  Asia  (London,  1919),  and  H.  A.  Gibbons,  The  New  Map  of  Asia 
(New  York,  1919).  How  China  has  tried  to  adapt  herself  to  new 
conditions  is  explained  in  H.  M.  Vinacke's  Modern  Constitutional 
Development  in  China  (Princeton,  1921). 

FEENCH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION 

(Chapters  4,  11,  15,   17,  43) 

Singularly  few  books  dealing  specifically  with  French  colonial 
expansion  are  accessible  to  the  American  reader.  Reference  must 
be  made  to  chapters  on  the  colonies  in  the  various  histories  of 
France,  especially  A.  Malet,  Histaire  de  France  (Paris,  1916),  and 
to  the  forthcoming  volumes  in  the  new  French  history  now  being 
published  under  the  editorship  of  G.  Hanotaux.  There  is  a  sum- 
mary of  the  extension  of  the  colonial  empire  under  the  Third  Re- 
public in  W.  S.  Davis,  History  of  France  (Boston,  1919).  0. 
Reclus,  Atlas  de  la  Plus  Grande  France  (Paris,  1915),  is  useful,  and 
the  standard  work  is  M.  Dubois  and  A  Terrier,  Un  siecle  d'  expan- 
sion coloniale  (Paris,  reissued  at  various  dates).  Care  should  be 
taken  to  secure  the  latest  edition.  I  have  not  space  to  list  the  books 
that  I  have  used  for  particular  colonies.  My  own  The  New  Map  of 
Africa  (New  York,  1916)  gives  the  development  of  the  African 
colonies  without  much  detail. 

BRITISH  COLONIAL  EXPANSION 

(Chapters  1,  5,  6,   11,   13,   14,  15,  44,  47) 

The  indispensable  work  is  C.  P.  Lucas,  A  Historical  Geography 
of  the  British  Colonies,  6  vols.  (Oxford,  1922),  with  which  ought  to 
be  read  H.  E.  Egerton's  brief  and  excellent  introduction,  The 
Origin  and  Gro^vth  of  Greater  Britain  (Oxford,  1920),  and  his 
Shart  History  of  British  Colonial  Policy  (5th  ed.,  Oxford,  1919). 
I  have  used  also  W.  H.  Woodward,  A  Short  History  of  the 
Expansion  of  the  British  Empire:  1500-1911  (London,  1912)  ;  A.  J. 
Herbertson  and  0.  J.  R.  Howarth,  The  Oxford  Survey  of  the  Brit- 
ish Empire,  12  vols.  (Oxford,  1914)  ;  and  J.  P.  Bulkeley,  The  Brit- 


582  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

ish  Empire:  A  Short  History  (Oxford,  1921).  The  most  penetrat- 
ing studies  of  colonial  problems  and  imperial  relations  are :  R.  Jebb, 
Studies  in  Colonial  Nationalism  (London,  1905)  ;  and  L.  Curtis, 
The  Commonwealth  of  Nations  (London,  1916).  Since  1911,  The 
Round  Tahle,  published  in  London  four  times  a  year,  has  given  the 
best  critical  commentary  on  events  and  tendencies  within  the  Brit- 
ish Empire.  On  particular  phases,  important  works  are:  Lord 
Cromer,  Modern  Egypt,  2  vols.  (London,  1908)  ;  Lord  Milner,  Eiig- 
land  and  Egypt  (London,  1904)  ;  Sir  T.  W.  Holderness,  Peoples  and 
Problems  of  India  (London,  1912)  ;  Lajpat  Rai,  England's  Deht  to 
India  (New  York,  1917)  ;  H.  T.  Turner,  The  First  Decade  of  the 
Australian  Commonwealth  (London,  1911)  ;  R.  H.  Brand,  The 
Union  of  South  Africa  (London,  1909)  ;  A.  B.  Keith,  Responsible 
Government  in  the  Domiriions,  3  vols.  (London,  1912)  ;  B.  Williams, 
Cecil  Rhodes  (London,  1921)  ;  General  Smuts,  Speeches  (London, 
1918)  ;  and  P.  S.  Reinsch,  Colonial  Government  (New  York,  1902). 
S.  Kennedy,  The  Pan- Angles  (London,  1914),  and  A.  G.  Gardiner, 
The  Anglo-American  Future  (New  York,  1921),  deal  with  the  ques- 
tion discussed  in  Chapter  XL VII. 

RUSSIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION 
(Chapters   8,  9,   11,   12,   14,  32,  41) 

F.  H,  Skrine,  The  Expansion  of  Russia:  1815-1900  (Cambridge, 
1904),  and  A.  Krausse,  Russia  in  Asia:  1558-1899  (London,  1900), 
give  the  best  and  fullest  accounts.  The  two  monumental  histories 
of  Russia,  however,  should  be  consulted :  A.  N.  Rambaud,  Histoire 
de  la  Russie  (rev.  ed.,  Paris,  1900),  and  A.  Kleinschmidt,  Drei 
Jahrhunderterussischer  Geschichte:  1598-1898  (Berlin,  1898),  and 
the  recent  admirable  short  history:  R.  Beazley,  N.  Forbes,  and 
G.  A.  Birkett,  Russia  (Oxford,  1918).  Light  on  colonial  policies  is 
contained  in  The  Memoirs  of  Count  Witte  (New  York,  1921),  trans, 
and  ed.  by  A.  Yarmolinsky;  and  in  A.  Iswolski's  Recollections  of  a 
Foreign  Minister  (New  York,  1921),  trans,  by  C.  L.  Seeger.  The 
Persian  policy  of  Russia  and  the  working  out  of  the  Anglo-Persian 
Agreement  is  given  in  W.  M.  Shuster's  The  .Strangling  of  Persia 
(New  York,  1912).  The  books  cited  under  the  Near  East,  the  Far 
East,  and  Japanese  expansion  deal  also  with  Russian  colonial  ex- 
pansion and  foreign  policy. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  583 

GERMAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION 
(Chapters  7,  16,   17,   28) 

The  most  comprehensive  work  is  A.  Zimmermann,  Geschichte  der 
deutschen  Kolonmlpolitik  (Berlin,  1914),  but  alonor  with  it  should 
be  read  E.  Tonnelat,  L'Expansion  allemande  hors  d'Europe  (Paris, 
1908),  E.  Lewin,  The  Germans  and  Africa  (London,  1915),  and 
A.  F.  Calvert,  The  Gerfrian  African  Empire  (London,  1916).  As  all 
the  German  colonies  have  changed  hands,  it  is  unnecessary  to  refer 
to  specific  works  concerning  their  past  status.  But,  as  the  question 
of  German  expansion  was  one  that  intimately  affected  the  internal 
political  growth  and  was  as  intimately  the  result  of  the  internal 
economic  growth  of  Germany  since  1870,  reference  is  advisable  to : 
Prince  von  Biilow,  Im/perial  Germany  (rev.  ed.,  London,  1916), 
trans,  by  M.  A.  Lewenz;  P.  Rohrbach,  German  World  Policies 
(New  York,  1915),  trans,  by  E.  von  Mach;  Count  von  Reventlow, 
Deutschlands  auswdrtige  Politik  (Berlin,  1915)  ;  C.  Gauss,  The 
German  Emperor  as  Shown  in  His  Public  Utterances  (New  York, 
1915)  ;  K.  Naumann,  Mitteleuropa  (Berlin,  1916)  ;  G.  W.  Prothero, 
German  Opinion  and  German  Policy  Before  the  War  (London, 
1916).  I  have  found  illuminating:  J.  H.  Clapham,  The  Economic 
Development  of  France  and  Germany:  1815-1914  (Cambridge, 
1901)  ;  R.  H.  Fife,  Jr.,  The  German  Empire  Between  Tioo  Wars 
(New  York,  1916)  ;  C.  H.  Herford,  Germany  in  the  Nineteenth 
Century  (Manchester,  1915)  ;  K.  Helfferich,  Germany's  Economic 
Progress  and  National  Wealth:  1888-1913  (Berlin,  1915),  and  F.  A. 
Ogg,  Economic  Development  of  Modern  Europe  (New  York,  1917). 

ITALIAN  COLONIAL  EXPANSION 

(Chapters   19,  20,   25,  26,   36,  40) 

The  only  satisfactory  work  I  have  found  dealing  with  this  sub- 
ject is  G.  Assereto's  L'ltalia  e  le  sue  Colonic  (Novara,  1913). 
There  are  special  commercial  and  travel  books  on  the  Red  Sea  and 
Somaliland  colonies,  and  an  abundant  literature  has  grown  up  on 
Tripoli.  But  one  finds,  even  in  Italian,  singularly  little  about  the 
military  situation  in  the  colonies,  the  past  dealings  of  Italy  with 
Abyssinia,  and  the  attitude  of  Italy  towards  Tunisia,  except  what 
has  been  written  for  propaganda  purposes. 


584  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

JAPAHTJSE  <X>LONIAL  EXPANSION 

(Chapters   10,    11,    12,    28,   45,    47,   48,    49) 

The  facts  of  Japanese  expansion  are  given  fully  in  books  dealing 
"with  the  Far  East  and  China,  on  European  international  relations, 
and  on  the  conflicts  between  Russia  and  Japan.  Count  S.  Okuma 
compiled  a  work  called  Fifty  Years  of  New  Japan,  the  English  edi- 
tion of  which,  in  2  vols.,  was  edited  by  M.  B.  Huish  (London, 
1909).  Since  the  incorporation  of  Korea  in  the  empire  there  has 
been  no  special  book,  impartially  written,  on  the  Japanese  colonies 
by  a  foreigner.  The  attitude  of  the  Japanese  people  towards 
colonial  expansion  is  given  in  K.  Asakawa,  The  Russo-Japanese 
Conflict:  Its  Causes  and  Issues  (New  York,  1904) ;  I,  Nitobe,  The 
Japanese  Nation  (New  York,  1912) ;  and  K.  Kawakami,  Japan  in 
World  Politics  (New  York,  1917).  W.  W.  McLaren,  A  Political 
History  of  Japan  (New  York,  1916)  and  G.  E.  Uyehara,  The  Politi- 
cal Development  of  Japan:  1867-1909  (London,  1910),  give  the 
background  of  Japanese  expansion.  The  attitude  of  the  United 
States  is  well  described  in  P.  J.  Treat,  Japan  and  the  United  States: 
1853-1921  (Boston,  1921).  The  best  recent  survey  by  a  foreigner 
is  A.  S.  Hershey,  Modern  Japan  (New  York,  1919),  along  with 
which  should  be  read  A.  Gerard,  Ma  Mission  au  Japon:  1907-1914 
(Paris,  1919),  and  E.  Hovelaque,  Japon  (Paris,  1920).  An  invalu- 
able study  of  Japan's  position  in  world  aifairs  is  S.  K.  Hornbeck, 
Contemporary  Politics  in  the  Far  East  (New  York,  1916). 

AMERICAN  FOREIGN  POLICY 

(Chapters   29,   30,   31,    34,   46,   47,  49) 

For  reference,  W.  F.  Johnson,  America's  Foreign  Relations,  2 
vols.  (New  York,  1916),  is  excellent,  and  beside  it  should  be  placed 
J.  M.  Mathews,  The  Conduct  of  American  Foreign  Relations  (New 
York,  1922),  and  J.  B.  Moore,  Principles  of  American  Diplomacy 
(New  York,  1918).  A.  C.  Coolidge,  The  United  States  as  a  World 
Power,  and  J.  H.  Latane,  The  United  States  as  a  World  Power 
(New  York,  1907),  were  the  pioneers  in  a  new  field  that  has  not 
up  to  the  present  time  been  either  exhaustively  or  comprehensively 
treated.  On  particular  phases  of  American  foreign  policy  we 
have:  A.  B.  Hart,  The  Monroe  Doctrine:  An  Interpretation  (Bos- 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  585 

ton,  1916)  ;  A,  T.  Mahan,  Interest  of  the  United  States  in  the  Sea 
Power  (New  York,  1902) ;  L.  C.  and  P.  F.  Ford,  The  Foreign  Trade 
of  the  United  States  (New  York,  1920)  ;  E.  N.  Hurley,  The  New 
Merchant  Marine  (New  York,  1920)  ;  J.  B.  Lockey,  Pan-Ameri- 
canism: Its  Beginnings  (New  York,  1920)  ;  and  M,  M.  Kalaw,  Self- 
Government  in  the  Philippine  Islands  (New  York,  1919)  and  The 
Case  for  the  Filipinos  (New  York,  1916).  Relations  with  Latin 
America  have  been  brought  into  one  volume  by  J.  H.  Latane,  The 
United  States  and  Latin  America  (New  York,  1920),  and  with 
Japan  by  P.  J.  Treat,  Japan  and  the  United  States  (Boston,  1921). 
E.  S.  Corwin  has  written  illuminatingly  on  The  President's  Con- 
trol of  Foreign  Relations  (Princeton,  1917),  and  the  changes  in 
America 's  international  relations  in  the  decade  preceding  the  World 
War  are  given  in  F.  A.  Ogg,  National  Progress:  1907-1917,  which  ia 
vol.  XXVII  of  The  American  Nation  (New  York,  1918).  Two  sug- 
gestive books,  critical  and  interpretative,  are:  W.  E.  Weyl,  Ameri- 
can World  Policies  (New  York,  1917)  and  C.  E.  Merriam,  American 
Political  Ideas  (New  York,  1920).  L.  S.  Rowe,  The  United  States 
and  Porto  Rico  (New  York,  1904),  raised  questions  which  American 
public  opinion  has  not  yet  passed  upon.  Still  worth  reading,  in 
gathering  up  the  threads  of  the  past,  are :  J.  W.  Foster,  A  Century 
of  American  Diplomacy  (Boston,  1900)  and  American  Diplomacy 
in  the  Onent  (Boston,  1903) ;  and  Ugo  Rabbeno,  The  American 
Commercial  Policy  (London,  1895). 

ORIGINS   AND    DIPLOMATIC   HISTORY   OF    THE   WORLD   WAR 

(Chapters   24,   25,   26,  31,   32) 

Books  that  could  be  listed  under  this  heading  are  legion,  and 
more  are  appearing  each  month.  I  cite  only  books  which  I  have 
found  of  service  in  making  clear  the  influence  of  world  politics  upon 
the  World  War. 

On  the  origins  of  the  war,  three  Americans  have  written  pene- 
tratingly and  accurately :  C.  Sejonour,  The  Diplomatic  Background 
of  the  War  (New  Haven,  1916)  ;  A.  BuUard,  The  Diplomacy  of  the 
Great  War  (New  York,  1916)  ;  and  W.  M.  Fullerton,  Problems  of 
Power  (New  York,  1914 — revised  ed.,  1920).  An  excellent  book 
to  be  read  with  these  three  is  J.  Bakeless,  The  Economic  Causes  of 
Modern  Wars  (New  York,  1921).    The  British,  French,  German, 


586  BIBLIOGEAPHY 

and  Austrian  theses  concerning  the  direct  responsibility  of  the 
war  are  obtained  in  J.  W.  Headlam,  The  History  of  Twelve  Days 
(London,  1915)  ;  J.  Reinach,  Les  Douze  Jours  (Paris,  1917)  ;  B.  von 
Mach,  Official  Diplomatic  Documents  Relating  to  the  Outbreak  of 
the  European  War  (New  York,  1916)  ;  and  R.  Goos,  Das  Wiener 
Kahinet  und  die  Entstehung  des  Weltkrieges  (Vienna,  1919).  E.  D. 
Morel,  Ten  Years  of  Secret  Diplomacy  (London,  1915)  ;  F.  Neil- 
son,  How  Diplomats  Make  War  (New  York,  1915)  ;  and  Y.  Guyot, 
The  Causes  and  the  Consequences  of  the  War  (New  York,  1916), 
trans,  by  F.  A.  Holt,  judge  the  work  of  European  statesmen  from 
the  viewpoint  of  the  layman.  F.  Delaisi,  La  Guerre  qui  Vient 
(Paris,  1911),  is  a  startling  prophecy  of  what  was  to  be  the  result 
of  the  Morocco  imbroglio.  It  was  translated  into  English  and 
published  (Boston,  1915)  under  the  title  The  Inevitable  War.  Pro- 
fessor G.  Murray  wrote  a  brief  critical  study,  The  Foreign  Policy 
of  Sir  Edward  Grey:  1906-1915  (Oxford,  1915).  Viscount  Haldane, 
Before  the  War  (New  York,  1920),  and  T.  Jonescu,  Origins  of  the 
War  (London,  1917),  have  reviewed  ante-bellum  negotiations  in 
which  these  statesmen  took  part. 

The  diplomatic  history  of  the  World  "War  has  not  yet  been  writ- 
ten. I  have  had  to  rely  upon  the  publication  of  documents  and 
speeches  and  correspondence  in  newspapers  and  periodicals,  and 
upon  books  and  pamphlets  that  were  circulated  chiefly  for  propa- 
ganda purposes.  Many  of  the  secret  treaties  concluded  during  the 
war  were  published  by  the  Petrograd  Izvestia  between  December, 
1917,  and  March,  1918,  from  the  archives  of  the  Russian  Ministry 
of  Foreign  Affairs.  These  were  translated  and  published  in  Eng- 
land by  the  Manchester  Guardian.  In  a  long  series  of  articles 
appearing  weekly  in  the  New  York  Times,  and  which  will  be  pub- 
lished in  book  form  in  the  autumn  of  1922,  R.  S.  Baker  has  been 
giving  to  the  world  the  secret  minutes  of  the  Peace  Conference,  in 
which  the  existence  of  additional  secret  treaties  is  divulged.  That 
there  were  such  agreements  was  known  long  ago,  and  their  general 
tenor  also  was  suspected.  For  what  I  have  written  about  the  entry 
of  Italy  into  the  World  War,  the  Balkan  affairs,  the  relations 
among  the  powers  from  1914  to  1918,  and  the  disruption  of  the 
Austro-Hungarian,  Russian,  and  Turkish  empires,  I  have  had  to 
rely  primarily  upon  information  derived  from  personal  contact 
•with  events  and  statesmen. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  587 

THE  PEACE  NEGOTIATIONS.  THE  EFFORT  TO  FORM  A  LEAGUE  OF 

NATIONS,  AND   INTERNATIONAL    DIPLOMACY   SINCE 

THE  PARIS   CONFERENCE 

(Cbapters   33,   34,   35,   36,    37,   38,    39,   40,    41,   48,   49) 

The  conference,  its  machinery,  its  problems,  its  treaties,  and 
how  they  have  been  applied,  are  discussed  in  more  or  less  detail  in 
A  History  of  the  Peace  Conference  of  Paris,  5  vols.  (London,  1920- 
1921),  ed.  by  H.  W.  V.  Temperley,  and  issued  under  the  auspices  of 
The  Institute  of  International  Affairs.  This  voluminous  undertak- 
ing is  informative  rather  than  critical.  Men  who  participated  in 
the  negotiations  have  written  as  follows:  President  Wilson,  Ad- 
dresses Delivered  on  the  Westerri  Tour  (Senate  Doc.  No.  120,  Wash- 
ington, 1919)  ;  A.  Tardieu,  The  Truth  About  the  Treaty  (Indian- 
apolis, 1921)  ;  E.  M.  House  and  C.  Seymour  (editors),  What  Really 
Happened  at  Paris  (New  York,  1921)  ;  R.  Lansing,  The  Peace  Ne- 
gotiations and  The  Big  Four  and  Others  of  the  Peace  Conference 
(Boston,  1921)  ;  J.  M.  Keynes,  The  Economic  Consequences  of  the 
Peace  (New  York,  1920)  and  A  Revision  of  the  Treaty  (New  York, 
1922)  ;  B.  Baruch,  The  Economic  Sections  of  the  Peace  Treaty 
(New  York,  1920)  ;  and  C.  H.  Haskins  and  R.  H.  Lord,  Some  Prob- 
lems of  the  Peace  Conference  (Boston,  1920).  In  addition  to  these 
narratives,  which  can  not  help  being — even  if  only  mildly — ex  parte, 
we  have  the  obsers^ations  of  three  shrewd  correspondents.:  H.  Han- 
son, The  Adventures  of  the  Fourteen  Points  (New  York,  1919)  ; 
C.  T.  Thompson,  The  Peace  Conference  Day  hy  Day  (New  York, 

1920)  ;  and  E.  J.  Dillon,  The  Inside  Story  of  the  Peace  Conference 
(New  York,  1920).  A  brief  commentary  on  the  treaties  is  A.  P. 
Scott,  An  Introduction  to  the  Peace  Treaties  (Chicago,  1920). 

Among  the  notable  books  written  on  the  post-treaty  situation 
are:  F.  A.  Vanderlip,  What  Happened  to  Europe  (New  York, 
1919)  and  Whit  Next  in  Europe  (New  York,  1922)  ;  A.  Deman- 
geon,  Le  Declin  de  VEurope  (Paris,  1920)  ;  F.  C.  Hicks,  The  New 
World  Order  (New  York,  1920)  ;  N.  Angel,  The  Fruits  of  Victory 
(New  York,  1921)  ;  W.  Rathenau,  The  New  Society  (New  York, 

1921)  ;  and  ex-Premier  Nitti,  Europe  Without  Peace  (London, 
1922).  E.  Antonelli's  L'Afrique  et  la  paix  de  Versailles  (Paris, 
1921)  is  the  most  informative  work  on  the  African  phases  of  the 
peace  conference  decisions. 

The  most  penetrating  European  comment  on  the  League  of  Na- 


588  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

tions  is  to  be  found  in  J.  L.  Garvin,  The  Economic  Foundations  of 
Peace  (London,  1919)  ;  G.  Ferrero,  Problems  of  Peace  (New  York, 
1919)  ;  and  M.  Erzberger,  The  League  of  Nations  the  Way  to  the 
World's  Peace  (New  York,  1919),  trans,  by  B.  Miall.  A  succinct 
account  of  the  beginning  of  the  experiment  is  given  in  G.  G.  Wil- 
son, The  First  Year  of  the  League  of  Nations  (Boston,  1921)  ; 
H,  W.  V.  Temperley,  The  Second  Year  of  the  League  of  Nations 
(London,  1922).  The  entire  subject  of  international  organization 
is  covered  in  P.  B.  Potter,  Introduction  to  the  Study  of  Interna- 
tional Organization  (New  York,  1922). 

The  best  collection  of  documents  and  speeches  in  connection  with 
the  diplomatic  history  of  the  war,  the  peace  negotiations,  the  con- 
tinuation conferences,  and  the  post-bellum  problems  and  experi- 
ments in  international  relations  is  contained  in  the  Documents 
of  the  American  Association  for  International  Conciliation,  Nos.  83- 
185  (New  York,  1914-1922).  This  collection  is  rich  in  treaties, 
diplomatic  correspondence,  and  speeches  of  the  principal  actors  in 
the  World  War  and  the  peace  negotiations.  It  contains  all  the  im- 
portant treaties  and  agreements,  not  only  of  the  Paris  and  the  con- 
tinuation conferences,  but  also  the  text  of  the  agreements  among  the 
Entente  powers  and  between  the  Entente  powers  and  non-Euro- 
pean states.  With  equal  accuracy  and  completeness,  but  in  less 
convenient  form  for  reference,  this  same  ground  is  covered  by  Cur- 
rent History,  published  monthly  by  the  New  York  Times.  LitteU's 
Living  Age,  published  weekly  in  Boston,  reprints  many  important 
articles  on  world  conditions  by  European  writers,  almost  all  of 
which  are  well  worth  reading.  The  World's  Work  (New  York)  has 
given  excellent  maps  of  territorial  changes  resulting  from  the 
World  War.  In  conclusion,  this  bibliography  would  not  be  com- 
plete without  calling  attention  to  the  unique  service  that  has  been 
rendered  to  the  American  public  by  the  Literary  Digest  (New 
York),  whose  editors  have  published  since  1919  informative  special 
articles,  giving  concisely  and  impartially  an  account  of  political 
and  economic  conditions  in  small  countries  and  contested  provinces, 
with  maps,  and  have  devoted  special  numbers,  with  maps,  to  the 
larger  states  in  turn.  Reference  to  the  Literary  Digest  index  from 
1919  to  1922  will  lead  the  student  to  statistical  data  and  maps 
illustrating  virtually  all  the  problems  of  international  relations 
during  the  era  of  world  reconstruction. 


INDEX 


Abdul  Hamid,  Sultan  of  Turkey,  99 
et  seq. 

Abyssinia,  British  war  with,  1868,  75; 
Italian  influence  in,  230-3 

Aden,  occupation  of,  by  British,  75 

Afghanistan,  rivalry  between  Great 
Britain  and  Kussia  for  control  of, 
87-8 

Africa,  extension  of  French  colonial 
empire  in  northern,  25-6;  British 
expansion  in,  171  et  seq.;  German 
annexations  in,  198;  Italian  ex- 
pansion in,  228  et  seq. 

Africa,  central,  British  enterprise  in, 
78-9 

Agadir  incident,  214-15 

Alaska,  purchased  by  United  States, 
69 

Albania,  status  of,  after  1913,  266 
et  seq. 

Albanian  uprising  in  1903,  247 

Algeciras,  conference  of,  210-11 

Algeria,  French  conquest  of,  54-5 

Anam,   French   protectorate    over,    60 

Anglo-Japanese   alliance,   155 

Angora,  treaty  of,  1921,  436 

Armenian  atrocities,  112 

Armenians,  deserted  after  European 
War,  454 

Ascension,  British  conquest  of,  65 

Ashanti  War  of  1873-4,  79 

Asia  Minor,  railway  concessions  to 
Germans  in,  204 

Assab,  port  occupied  by  Italy,  229  ^ 

Australia,  first  British  settlement  in, 
65;  development  of  colonization  of, 
71;   discovery  of  gold,  in,  71 

Austria-Hungary,  formation  of  dual 
monarchy,  34;  steps  in  creation  of, 
36-7;  war  with  France  in  1859,  46; 
war  with  Prussia  in  1866,  46;  Aus- 
tria expelled  from  German  confed- 
eration, 46;  and  Near  Eastern 
question,  97-8,  104-6;  annexes  Bos- 
nia and  Herzegovina,  221 ;  ultima- 
tum to  Serbia,  1914,  275;  declares 
war  against  Serbia,  276;  disintegra- 
tion of  empire,  367  e'  seq.;  treaty 


of     St.     Germain,    382;     separatist 
movements  in,  410;   dismemberment 
of,  412 
Austro-Prussian  War  of   1866,  46 

Balance  of  power,  as  conceived  by 
framers  of  the  Act  of  Vienna,  20; 
445 

Balkans,  entrance  of  Germany  into 
politics  of,  98;  wars  in,  in  1912 
and  1913,  99;  progress  towards 
statehood  in,  101  et  seq.;  hatred  of 
Turks  in,  108;  Germany  aims  at 
control  of,  203 ;  intrigues  of  the 
great  powers  in  (1903-1912),  246 
et  seq.;  note  of  the  powers  to,  1912, 
252;  war  against  Turkey  (1912- 
1913),  254  et  seq.;  the  Balkan 
tangle  (1913-1914),  261  et  seq.;  war 
between  Bulgaria  and  Greece  and 
Serbia,  263-4;  Eumania  declares 
war  on  Bulgaria,  264;  armistice 
signed,  265 ;  status  of  Albania,  266 
et  seq. ;  alinement  of  in  European 
War   (1914-1917),  294  et  seq. 

Baluchistan,  British  protectorate  over, 
76 

Barbary  pirates,  25 

Belgium,  neutrality  violated,  278;  and 
Congo   Free   State,  475-8 

Berlin,  Congress  of,  1878,  49-50 

Berlin  Memorandum,  1876,  46 

Black  Sea,  neutralized,  43;  neutrality 
abrogated,  46 

Boer  war,  176-7 

Bolshevist  regime  in  Eussia,  463  et 
seq. ;  fear  of  spread  of,  469 

Bombay,  ceded  by  Portugal  to  Great 
Britain,  73 

Bosnia,  annexed  by  Austria,  221 

Bosphorus,  closed  to  foreign  ships  of 
war,  44 

Boxer  rebellion  in  China,  146  et 
seq. 

Brest -Litovsk,  treaty  of,  408 

Brussels  Conference,  1920,  555;  1921, 
557 

Buhkarest,  treaty  of,  408 


589 


590 


INDEX 


Bulgaria,  status  of,  as  fixed  by  Con- 
gress of  Berlin,  1878,  49;  indepen- 
dence proclaimed,  104,  221 ;  joins 
Central  Powers  in  European  War, 
297;  and  treaty  of  Neuilly,  422  et 
seq. 

Burma,  annexed  by  Great  Britain,  76 

Cambodia,   French    protectorate   over, 

60 
Canada,  War  of   1812  proves  attach- 
ment   of,    to     Great    Britain,     68; 
Dominion  of,  formed,  69 

Cannes,  conference  of,  1922,  451,  559 

Canning,  George,  British  Foreign  Min- 
ister, opposes  restoration  of  colonies 
to  Spain,  25 

Cape  of  Good  Hope,  British  conquest 
of,   65 

"Capitulations,"  definition  of,  100  n. 

Caucasian  territories,  ceded  to  Eussia, 
114 

Central  Asia,  Kussian  expansion  in, 
117-18 

Central  Empires,  Triple  Entente 
against  (1914),  272  et  seq.;  United 
States  in  coalition  against,  358  et 
seq. 

Ceylon,  British  conquest  of,  65 

' '  Civilization, ' '  history  of,  developed 
in   Mediterranean  lands,  3 

China,  compelled  to  cede  territory  and 
commercial  privileges,  38-9;  treaty 
rights  granted  foreign  powers  in, 
118;  treaties  with  Russia,  119-20; 
war  with  Japan,  136;  attempt  to 
partition  (1895-1902),  139  et  seq.; 
Boxer  rebellion,  146  et  seq.;  result- 
ing demands  and  settlements,  150- 
7;  German  acquisitions  in,  201-2; 
as  a  republic  (1906-1917),  305  et 
seq.;  emperor  abdicates,  310;  atti- 
tude of  great  powers  towards  re- 
public, 311  et  seq.;  civil  dissensions 
in,  314  et  seq. 

Church,  allegiance  to  divisions  of,  a 
disruptive  influence,  6 

Clayton-Bulwer  Treaty,  346 

Coa^  and  iron  become  greatest  sources 
of  wealth  and  military  power,  22 

Cochin-China,  provinces  ceded  to 
France,  60 

Congo  Free  State,  475-8 

Congo,  upper,  French  penetrate,  58 

Continuation  Conferences:  from  Lon- 
don to  Genoa  (1919-1922),  548  et 
seq. 

Crimea,  ceded  to  Eussia,  114 


Crimean  War,  42-3;   influence  of,  on 

rise  of  world  powers,  45 
Cypress    Convention,    86 
Czech  republic  proclaimed,  375 

Dahomey,  conquered  by  France,  58 
Declaration    of    the    Rights    of    Man, 

1789,    beginning    of    new    epoch    in 

European  history,   19 
De    Lesseps,    Ferdinand,   builds   Suez 

Canal,  85 
Dutch  East  Indies,  480-2 

Eastern  question,  as  affected  by  the 
Congress  of  Berlin,  49-50 

Egypt,  becomes  bankrupt,  90;  mili- 
tary occupation  of,  91 ;  held  by 
Great  Britain,  92;  expansion  of,  93; 
Arabi  Pasha 's  revolt,  93 ;  the 
Mahdi,  93-4;  Khartum  captured  by 
the  Mahdi  and  Gordon  and  garrison 
killed,  94 ;  and  Anglo-French  agree- 
ment of  1904,  185  et  seq. 

Elizabeth,  Queen,  patent  to  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  68 

English-speaking  nations,  bases  of 
solidarity  among,  535  et  seq. 

Entente  Cordial,  grows  out  of  colonial 
expansion  of  France,  64;  see  also 
Triple  Entente 

European  war,  1814-1818,  276  et  seq.; 
attempts  to  prevent,  276-7 ;  powers 
engaged  in,  278;  first  battle  of  the 
Marne,  282;  Italy's  entrance  into 
the  Entente  (1915),  283  et  seq.; 
alinement  of  Balkan  states  in 
(1914-1917),  294  et  seq.;  entrance 
of  United  States,  358  et  seq.;  Rus- 
sian revolution,  367;  disintegration 
of  Romanoff,  Hapsburg,  and  Otto- 
man empires  (1917-1918),  367  et 
seq. ;  establishment  of  peace  pre- 
vented by  unsatisfied  nationalist 
aspirations  and  divergent  policies, 
442  et  seq. 

Far  East,  British  moves  in,  1895-1902, 
168 

Finland,  annexed  by  Eussia,  114 

Fiume,  548,  549 

Foreign  policies,  arguments  for  strong, 
23-4 

France,  loss  of  colonies,  13-14;  sea 
power  broken,  14;  leads  in  evolu- 
tion of  national  self -consciousness, 
19 ;  extension  of  colonial  empire  in 
northern  Africa,  25-6 ;  fall  of  Or- 
leans dynasty,  32;  in  Crimean  War, 


INDEX 


591 


42-3;  war  with  Austria  in  1859,  46; 
Franco-Prussian  War,  1870-71,  46; 
colonial  expansion,  1830-1900,  52  et 
seq.;  part  taken  in  attempt  to  par- 
tition China,  141  et  seq.;  Anglo- 
rrench  agreement  of  1904  on  Egypt 
and  Morocco,  185  et  seq.;  Franco- 
German  dispute  over  Morocco  (1905- 
1911),  207  et  seq.;  protectorate 
over  Morocco  established,  218;  in- 
vaded by  Germany,  1914,  278;  pol- 
icy of,  after  European  War,  448  et 
seq.;  colonial  problems  (1901-1922), 
483  et  seq. ;  in  Syria,  484-5 ;  in  the 
Far  East,  485;  north  African  em- 
pire, 487-8 ;  use  of  colonials  for 
military  service,  488-90;  wealth  of 
colonies,  490-1 
Franchise,  expansion  of,  causes  defer- 
ence to  pulbic  opinion,  23 
Franco-Austrian  "War  of  1859,  46 
Franco-Prussian  War,  1870-71,  46 
Franz  Ferdinand,  of  Austria,  Arch- 
duke, and  his  wife  assassinated, 
1914,  274 
French  Eevolution,  principles  of,  writ- 
ten into  the  heart  of  Europe,  19 

Gabun,  France  mistress  of,  58 
Galicia  incorporated  into  Poland,  375 
Georgia,  annexed  by  Eussia,  114 
German  East  Africa,  478 
Germany,  aftermath  of  Eevolution  of 
1848  in,  33  et  seq.;  steps  in  crea- 
tion of  German  empire,  35;  treaty 
of  Paris  a  factor  in  hastening  uni- 
fication of,  45-6 ;  entrance  of,  into 
Balkan  politics,  98 ;  part  in  attempt 
to  partition  China,  142  et  seq. ;  in 
Boxer  rebellion,  152-3 ;  gains  Span- 
ish islands  in  Pacific,  169 ;  shut  out 
from  Persia  by  Anglo-Eussian 
agreement  of  1907,  184;  attempts 
to  block  French  in  Morocco,  191 ; 
development  of  Weltpolitilc,  195  et 
seq.;  growth  in  industry  and  pros- 
perity after  war  of  1870,  196-7; 
colonial  acquisitions,  198  et  seq.; 
province  of  Shantung  comes  under 
control  of,  201 ;  aim  of  control  of 
Austro-Hungary  and  the  Balkans, 
203;  Great  Britain  recognizes  men- 
ace of  German  approach  to  Persian 
Gulf,  204;  increase  of  economic  in- 
terests in  the  Ottoman  empire,  205; 
Franco-German  dispute  over  Mo- 
rocco (1905-1911),  207  etseq.;  stands 
behind  Austro-Hungary  in  annexa- 


tion of  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina, 
272;  invades  France,  1914,  278; 
observations  on  treaty  of  Versailles, 
406;  indemnity  after  European 
War,  552  et  seq. 
Gold,  discovery  of,  in  Australia,  71 
Gordon,   General,   killed   in   Khartum, 

94 
Greece,  advantages  gained  from  re- 
vision of  San  Stefano  treaty,  105 
et  seq.;  in  European  War,  1914- 
1918,  298-301 
Greek  War  of  Liberation,  26 
Great  Britain,  acquires  colonies  of 
France,  13-14;  battle  of  Trafalgar 
gives  her  a  free  hand  in  America, 
14;  compels  China  to  cede  territory 
and  commercial  privileges,  38 ;  in 
Crimean  War,  42-3 ;  intervenes 
against  Eussia  in  settlement  of 
Eastern  question,  1878,  48  et  seq.; 
prepares  way  for  occupation  of 
Egypt,  50;  Cyprus  convention,  50; 
backs  Morocco  against  France  and 
Spain,  56;  colonial  agreements  with 
France,  58  et  seq.;  colonial  expan- 
sion of,  1815-1878,  65  et  seq.;  nega- 
tive role  in  international  diplomacy 
from  Congress  of  Vienna  to  Con- 
gress of  Berlin,  66;  development  of, 
during  Napoleonic  wars,  66-7 ;  abol- 
ishes slavery  in  colonies,  81 ;  Con- 
solidation of  power  in  the  near  East 
(1878-1885),  83  et  seq.;  secures 
control  of  Suez  Canal,  85;  part  in 
attempt  to  partition  China,  141  et 
seq.;  Anglo-Japanese  alliance,  155; 
revival  of  British  imperialism  (1895- 
1902),  166  et  seq.;  new  territorial 
acquisitions,  166-7;  further  expan- 
sion in  Africa,  171  et  seq.;  Boer 
War,  176-7;  Persia  and  the  agree- 
ment with  Eussia  in  1907,  178  et 
seq. ;  Anglo-French  agreement  of 
1904  on  Morocco  and  Egypt,  185 
et  seq.;  recognizes  menace  of  Ger- 
man approach  to  Persian  Gulf,  204 ; 
declares  war  on  Germany,  1914, 
278;  arbitrates  dispute  with  Vene- 
zuela, 1895,  342;  policy  of,  after 
European  War,  450;  imperial  prob- 
lems (1903-1922),  494  et  seq.;  em- 
pire bound  by  tie  of  interest,  495; 
dominions  throw  in  their  lot  with 
mother  country  at  outbreak  of 
European  War,  497;  danger  to 
solidarity  of  empire,  499;  Indian 
problems,   501    et   seq.;    nationalist 


592 


INDEX 


agitation  in  Egypt,  505-7;  in 
Mesopotamia,  507-8;  power  and 
commercial  influence  in  Far  East, 
510-11;  and  United  States  ought 
to  face  tlie  future  together,  538; 
settlement  of  Irish  question, 
546 
Guiana,  British  conquest  of  part  of, 
65,  79 

Hanseatic  League,  10-11 

Hapsburg     dominions,     formation     of 

dual  monarchy,  in,  34 
Herzegovina,  annexed  by  Austria,  221 
' '  History  of  the  Peace  Conference  of 

Paris,   A,"   382   n. 
Holy  Alliance,  21 ;   proposes  interven- 
tion in  favor  of  Spain  against  her 

revolting  colonies,  24 
Holy  Eoman  Empire,  10 
Honduras,  British,  80 
Hong-Kong,    conquest    of,    by    Great 

Britain,  76 
Hungary,  treaty  of  Trianon  with,  416 

et    seq. ;     dealings    with    successor 

states  of,  418 

Ibrahim  Pasha,  27,  28 

India,  Sepoy  mutiny  in,  45;  conquest 
of,  by  British,  1801-1817,  65,  73-4; 
501-5 

Indo-China,  French  administrative 
control  of,  61 

Ionian  islands,  27 

Irish  question,  settlement  of,  546 

Iron  and  coal  become  source  of  wealth 
and  military  power,  22 

Irredentism,  284 

Italians  as  traders  and  explorers,  9 

Italy,  unification  of,  34;  steps  in 
creation  of,  35-6;  Treaty  of  Paris 
a  factor  in  hastening  unification  of, 
45-6;  colonial  agreement  with 
France,  57;  and  Near  Eastern  ques- 
tion, 98;  expansion  in  Africa  (1882- 
1911),  228  et  seq.;  reopens  Near 
Eastern  question,  236  et  seq.; 
Young  Turks  oppose  ambitions  in 
Tripoli,  238 ;  ultimatimi  to  Turkey, 
1911,  239-40;  war  with  Turkey, 
240-4;  takes  Tripoli,  240;  annexes 
Tripoli  and  Benghazi,  241 ;  peace 
with  Turkey,  244;  entrance  into  the 
Entente  (1915),  283  et  seq.;  de- 
clares war  on  Austria,  289 ;  secret 
treaty  with  Entente,  290-1 ;  policy 
of,  after  European  War,  450-1 


Jameson's  raid,  176 

Japan,  opened  to  foreign  intercourse, 
37,  131;  development  as  world 
power,  38;  commercial  treaties,  40; 
opposes  Eussia  in  north  Pacific, 
115;  treaties  with  Russia,  120-1; 
not  allowed  foothold  in  Asia  after 
Chino-Japanese  war,  125,  136;  war 
with  China,  130  et  seq.;  Occiden- 
talization  of,  132-4;  program  of  re- 
forms, 138;  and  partition  of  China, 
140  et  seq.;  Anglo- Japanese  alli- 
ance, 155;  war  with  Russia,  158  et 
seq.;  captures  Port  Arthur,  162; 
treaty  of  peace  with  Russia,  163; 
in  European  War  (1914-1918),  318 
et  seq.;  captures  Shantung,  320-1; 
twenty-one  demands  on  China,  323; 
understanding  with  Russia,  1916, 
326;  post  bellum  foreign  policy  of 
(1919-1922),  514  et  seq.;  wealth 
and  population,  514-15;  aims  of 
foreign  policy,  518,  anti-militarist 
movement  in,  520 

Jugo-Slavs,  375-6 

Kernan,  Major-General,  U.  S.  A.,  426 

n. 
Elhartum,    siege    and   capture   of,   by 

Mahdi,  94 
Korea,  127,  134-6,  138-142 
Kultur,  537 

Latin-American     republics     and     the 
United  States   (1893-1917),  340   et 
seq. 
League  of  nations,  attempt  to  create 
at   Paris,  381    et   seq.;    real   power 
vested  in  Council  of,  383;   Entente 
statesman  favor,  386 ;  provisions  of, 
386-7;   President  Wilson  on,  387-8; 
organization    of,    388 ;    meeting    of 
Council  at  San  Sebastian,  1921,  557 
Limitation  of  Armaments  Conference 
at   Washington,    1921,    398,   561    et 
seq. 
London,  Conference  of,  in  1830,  41 
London   Conference,   1921,   556 
London,  Convention  of,  1814,  77 

Madagascar,  French  protectorate  over, 

58-9 
Madras,  becomes  British  in  1748,   73 
Mahdi,  the,  revolt  of,  in  Egypt,  93-4 
Malta,  British  conquest  of,  65 
Maritime    international    law,    changes 

in,  made  in  1856,  44-5 
Marne,  first  battle  of,  282 


INDEX 


593 


Mauritius,  British  conquest  of,  65 

Mehemet  Ali,  27,  28 

Mexico,  oil  production  of,  349 

Monroe  Doctrine,  promulgation  of, 
keeps  the  United  States  out  of 
■world  politics  for  more  than  seventy- 
five  years,  25 ;  international  status 
of,  354-6 

Montenegro,  independence  recognized, 
1878,  49;  declares  war  on  Austria- 
Hungary,  1914,  294  J  concludes 
armistice,  298 

Morocco,  56-7 ;  and  Anglo-French 
agreement  of  1904,  185  et  seq.; 
Franco-German  dispute  over  (1905- 
1911),  207  et  seq.;  French  protec- 
torate established,  218 

Mukden,  battle  of,  162 

Miirzsteg    program,    110,    248 

Natal,  proclaimed  British  territory,  69 
National    self -consciousness    first    dis- 
cerned, 17 ;   evolution  of,  19 
Nationalism  and  steam  power,  17   et 
seq.;    effects   in    19th    century,    21; 
spirit  of,   at  work  in  international 
relations,  24 
Navarino,  naval  battle  of,  27 
Near   Eastern    Question    (1879-1908), 
96  et  seq.;  reopened  by  Italy,  236 
et  seq. 
Nepal,    brought    under   British   influ- 
ence, 65 
Neuilly,  treaty  of,  and  world  politics, 

422  et  seq.' 
New  Zealand,  settled  by  British,  71 
Northern  Pacific,  Kussians  gain  foot- 
hold on,  114 

Obrenovitch,   Milosh,   26 

Oceania,  French  colonial  acquisitions 
in,  62-3;  extension  of  British  em- 
pire in,  78 

"Open  door,"  in  China,  144 

Orange  Free  State,  70 

Oregon  Treaty,  1846,  68 

Orleans  dynasty,  fall  of,  in  France,  32 

Ottoman  Empire,  attempts  of  Euro- 
pean powers  to  sacrifice  subject 
races  of,  to  their  interests,  26  et 
seq.;  disintegration  of,  367  et 
seq. 

Pacific,  German  acquisitions  in,  198 
Panama  Canal,  346  et  seq. 
Paris,  Congress  of,  in  1856,  43-4 
Paris,  Declaration  of,  1856,  on  mari- 
time international  law,  44 


Paris,  Treaty  of,  1856,  43-4;  factor 
in  hastening  unification  of  Germany 
and  Italy,  45-6 

Paris,  Peace  Conference  at,  1919,  30; 
381  et  seq.;  treaties  adopted,  388 

Paris  Conference,  1921,  555 

Peace  after  European  war,  failure  to 
establish,  442,  et  seq. 

Peace  of  Vienna,  1815,  objects  of,  20 

Persia,  and  the  Anglo-Russian  agree- 
ment of  1907,  178  et  seq. 

Persian  Gulf,  control  of,  75-6 

Poland,  Galicia  incorporated  into,  375 

Port  Arthur,  fortification  of,  by  Rus- 
sia, 158;  captured  by  Japanese,  162 

Portsmouth,  Treaty  of,  163 

Portugal,  cedes  Bombay  to  Great 
Britain,  73 

Portuguese  colonial  possessions,  474-5 

Prussia,  in  Congress  of  Paris,  1856, 
43,  45;  war  with  Austria  in  1866, 
46;  Franco-Prussian  War,  1870-1, 
46 

Public  opinion,  expansion  of  franchise 
produces  deference  to,  23 

Racial  or  national   supremacy,   17 

Radetsky,  on  attitude  of  Russia  to- 
wards Ottoman  Empire,  96 

Railways,  become  an  important  factor 
in  economic  life,   22 

Rapallo,  treaty  of,  1920,  453 

Red  Sea,  British  secure  control  of,  75 

Revolution,  French,  sec  French  Revo- 
lution 

Revolutions  of  1848,  32-3 

Roman  republic  put  to  an  end  by 
French,   32 

Roosevelt,  President,  163 

Rumania,  principality  of,  constituted, 
47;  independence  recognized,  1878, 
49;  in  European  War,  301  et  seq.; 
declares  war  on  Austria-Hungary, 
1916,  303 ;  conquered  by  Central 
Powers,   304 

Russia,  encroachments  on  China,  40; 
wars  against  Turkey,  41 ;  Crimean 
War,  42-3 ;  goes  to  assistance  of 
Balkans  against  Turkey,  48 ;  dic- 
tates peace  to  Turkey,  1878,  48; 
forced  to  leave  solution  of  Eastern 
question  to  the  other  powers  at  Con- 
gress of  Berlin,  1878,  49-50;  rivalry 
with  Great  Britain  for  control  of 
Afghanistan,  87-8;  efforts  to  gain 
control  in  the  Near  East,  96  et  seq. ; 
effort  to  control  Bulgaria.  104;  colo- 
nial expansion  (1829-1878),  113   et 


594 


INDEX 


seq.',  consolidation  of  power  in  Far 
East  (1879-1903),  122  et  seq.; 
would  not  Japan  foothold  on  Asia 
after  Chino-Japanese  war,  125,  136; 
war  with  Japan,  129,  158  et  seq.; 
part  in  attempt  to  partition  China, 
140  et  seq. ;  secures  concessions  in 
northern  China,  154;  agreement 
with  China,  1902,  156;  treaty  of 
peace  with  Japan,  1905,  163  ;  Anglo- 
Eussian  agreement  of  1907  and 
Persia,  178  et  seq.;  mobilization, 
1914,  278;  disintegration  of  empire, 
367  et  seq.;  revolution  in,  367,  457 
et  seq. ;  roots  of  revolution,  458 ; 
clash  between  groups,  459;  army 
disappears  as  factor  in  war,  462; 
Bolshevist  regime,  463  et  seq. ; 
treaty  of  Brest-Litovsk,  465 ;  En- 
tente troops  in,  466  et  seq. ;  influ- 
ence of  revolution  on  world  politics, 
468;  Soviet  Eussia  during  1921,  472 

Sahara,  French  influence  over  central, 

58 
St.    Germain,    treaty    of,    382;     and 
world    power,    407    et    seq.;    based 
upon  illusions,  413-15 
St.  Lucia,  British  conquest  of,  65 
San  Eemo  Conference,  1920,  451,  549- 

51 
San  Stefano,  Treaty  of,  48 
Sardinia,  in  Crimean  War,  43 
Scandinavians  as  pioneer  explorers,  10 
Sebastopol,  siege  of,  43 
"Secondary    States,"    overseas    pos- 
sessions   of     (1815-1922),    474    et 
seq. 
Sehegal,  French  colony,  57 
Sepoy  mutiny  in  India,  45,  74 
Serbia,  independence  recognized,  1878, 
49 ;     Austro-Hungarian     ultimatum 
to,  1914,  275;  Austria-Hungary  de- 
clares war  against,  276 
Serbians,    revolt    against    Turkey    in 

1804,  26 
Sfevres,  treaty  of,  and  world  politics, 

428  et  seq. 
Seychelles,  British  conquest  of,  65 
Shantung,  Germans  acquire  control  of, 

201 
Siam,  French  take  territory  from,  62 
Siberia,  114;  colonization  of  eastern, 

118 
Singapore,   leased   by  Great  Britain, 

76 
Smuts,  General,  protest  against  treaty 
of  Versailles,  400-1 


South  Africa,  under  British  rule,  69 

Spa  Conference,  1920,  553 

Sj^ain,  sea  power  of,  broken  by  battle 
of  Trafalgar,  14;  loss  of  American 
colonies,  24-5;  loses  Philippines  and 
other  eastern  colonies,  169;  over- 
seas possessions  after  treaty  of 
Paris,  478-9 

Spanish-American  war,  332,  338 

Spanish  colonies  in  America,  revolt  of, 
24 

Steam-engines,  manufacture  begun  by 
Watt   and   Boulton,    21 

Steam  power,  employed  for  transpor- 
tation, 22 

Steamships,  first  use  of,  22 

Subject  peoples  of  Central  Europe, 
policy  of  Entente  nations  in  regard 
to  reorganization  of,  371  et  seq. 

Sudan,  the,  British  administrative 
control  over,  79 

Suez  canal,  conceived  and  financed  by 
France,  53;  British  secure  control 
of,  85 

Syria,  conquered  by  Ibrahim  Pasha, 
"27 

Tasmania,  settled  by  British,  65 

Timbuktu,  captured  by  France,  58 

Tongking,  French  protectorate  over, 
61 

Trafalgar,  battle  of,  breaks  sea  power 
of  France  and  Spain,  14 

Transcaucasia,  Eussia  gains  control  of, 
116-7 

Trans-Siberian  Eailway,  123 

Transvaal  Eepublic,  70 

Transylvanians  in  union  with  Ru- 
mania,  375 

Trianon,  treaty  of,  and  world  politics, 
416  et  seq. 

Trinidad,  Malta,  British  conquest  of, 
65 

Triple  Entente,  the,  against  the  Cen- 
tral Empires  (1914),  272  et  seq.; 
diplomacy's  attempts  to  prevent  a 
general  war,  276  et  seq.;  Italy's  en- 
trance into  the  Entente  (1915),  283 
et  seq. ;  United  States  in  coalition 
with,  358  et  seq.;  policy  of,  in  re- 
organization of  subject  peoples  of 
Central  Europe,  371  et  seq.;  at 
Paris  Conference,  intention  to  keep 
final  decisions  in  their  own  hands, 
381-2 

Tripoli,  Italian  ambitions  in,  234,  237- 
9;  captured  and  annexed  by  Italy, 
240-1 


INDEX 


595 


Tristan  de  Cunha,  British  conquest  of, 

65 
Tunisia,  French  conquest  of,  55-6 
Turkey,  revolts  against,  26  et  seg. ; 
Russian  wars  against,  1828,  1854, 
and  1877,  41  et  seq.;  reforms  prom- 
ised in  1856  fail  to  materialize,  47- 
8;  claims  suzerainty  over  Tunisia, 
55;  Abdul  Hamid  Sultan  of,  99- 
100;  revision  of  San  Stefano  treaty 
and,  105  et  seq.;  Young  Turk  revo- 
lution, 219  et  seq.;  results  of  Young 
Turk  movement,  224-6;  war  with 
Italy,  240-4;  Balkan  war  against 
(1912-1913),  254  et  seq.;  joins  Cen- 
tral Powers  in  European  War,  294  j 
treaty  of  Sevres,  428  et  seq. 

Union  of  South  Africa,  478 

United  States,  promulgates  Monroe 
Doctrine,  25;  development  of,  37; 
and  partition  of  China,  143  et  seq.; 
in  world  politics  (1893-1917),  328 
et  seq.;  territorial  acquisitions,  331- 
2;  assertion  of  open  door  principle, 
332-3;  building  up  of  a  merchant 
marine,  333-5;  building  of  a  navy 
"second  to  none,"  335-6;  interven- 
tion in  other  countries,  policy  as  to, 
336-9;  and  the  Latin-American  re- 
publics, 340  et  seq.;  requests  Great 
Britain  to  arbitrate  with  Venezuela, 
1895,  341;  specific  legislative  en- 
dorsement of  Monroe  Doctrine,  343 ; 
Spanish- American  War,  344;  builds 
Panama  Canal,  348-9 ;  intervention 
in  Mexico,  in  1914  and  1916,  350-1; 
acquirements  and  intervention  in 
the  West  Indies,  351-3 ;  status  of 
Monroe  Doctrine,  354-6 ;  in  the  coa- 
lition against  the  Central  Empires 
(1917-1918),  358  et  seq.;  protests 
to  Great  Britain  against  interfer- 
ence with  American  trade,  360; 
notes  to  Germany,  361  et  seq.;  de- 
clares war  on  Germany,  363 ;  con- 
scription voted,  364;  forces  sent  to 
France,  364;  refusal  of,  to  ratify 
the  treaties  of  the  Paris  Conference 
and  enter  the   League  of  Nations, 

390  et  seq.;  treaty  fight  in  Senate, 

391  et  seq. ;  war  with  Germany  and 
Austria  terminated  by  joint  con- 
gressional resolution,  July,  1921, 
395;  provisions  of  treaty  of  Berlin, 
395-6;  claim  for  expense  of  Rhine 


army,  397;  place  of,  in  the  world 
(1920-1922),  522  et  seq.;  population 
of,  by  decades,  523 ;  immigration  to, 
523-7;  and  world  trade,  527-8;  ex- 
clusion from  fruits  of  victory  over 
Germany,  528-30;  strongest  of  the 
powers,  534;  and  British  Empire 
ought  to  face  the  future  together, 
538 

Verona,  Congress  of,  24-5,  26 

Versailles,  Treaty  of,  390;  and  world 

politics,    399    et    seq.;    marks    new 

stage  in  struggle  for  world  power, 

403 

Vienna,  Peace  of,  see  Peace  of  Vienna 

1 

War  criminals,  provision  for,  in  Ver- 
sailles treaty,   402 

Wars,  early,  localization  of  effects  of, 
17-18 

Washington  Conference  and  the  limi- 
tation of  armaments,  561  et  seq.; 
objects  of,  566;  ratio  of  capital 
ships,  572 

Webster-Ashburton  Treaty,   1842,  68 

Weltpolitilc,  German,  195  et  seq. 

Wilhelm  II,  German  Emperor,  195, 
196,  204,  274 

Wilson,  Woodrow,  President,  on 
League  of  Nations,  387-8;  illness  of, 
391 ;  and  United  States  Senate  on 
ratification  of  treaty,  392  et  seq. 

World  politics,  beginnings  of,  3  et 
seq.;  difference  made  by  era  of,  in 
the  aims  of  statesmanship,  52;  and 
treaty  of  Versailles,  399  et  seq. ;  and 
treaty  of  St.  Germain,  407  et  seq.; 
and  treaty  of  Trianon,  416  et  seq.; 
and  treaty  of  Neuilly,  422  et  seq.; 
and  treaty  of  Sevres,  428  et  seq.; 
influence  of  Russian  revolution  on, 
468 

World  powers,  rise  of,  1848-1878,  30 
et  seq.;  steps  in  creation  of,  35  et 
seq.;  influence  of  Crimean  War  on 
rise  of,  45  et  seq. 

Young  Turks,  revolution  in  Turkey, 
219  et  seq.;  oppose  Italian  ambi- 
tions in  Tripoli,  238 

Zanzibar,  British  supremacy  in,  58-9 
Z Oliver ein,  German  customs  union,  35, 
42 


Books  by 
HEEBERT  ADAMS  GIBBONS 


The  Foundation  of  the  Ottoman  Empire 

The  New  Map  of  Europe 

The  New  Map  of  Africa 

The  New  Map  of  Asia 

Paris  Reborn 

The  Little  Children  of  the  Luxembourg 

The  Blackest  Page  in  Modern  History 

The   Reconstruction   of   Poland   and   the 
Near  East 

Songs  from  the  Trenches 

Riviera  Towns 

France  and  Ourselves 

Venizelos  (in  the  Modern  Statesmen  Series) 

A  Selective    Bibliography   of   the   World 
War 

Ports  of  France 

An  Introduction  to  World  Politics 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


A     000  644  771     8 


